MUMBAI: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has submitted its chargesheet at a city court on Monday against suspended Enforcement Directorate (ED) assistant director Sandeep Singh as part of its probe against him in an alleged ₹20 lakh bribery case. In August, the CBI laid a trap and arrested Singh for allegedly demanding and accepting the bribe from a Mumbai-based jeweller by threatening to arrest his son in a money laundering case.
Singh, who was with ED’s Delhi unit then, had allegedly demanded the bribe from the case’s complainant, while conducting a search at the complainant’s Mumbai premises at Wadala on August 3 and 4. He had allegedly posed as the investigating officer of an ED money-laundering case probe in which a gold firm was under the scanner. Singh had however conducted the search merely as the Search Warrant Authorised Officer, according to the CBI. The firm was suspected to be part of the money-laundering aspect of the case due to which the ED search was carried out.
According to the CBI, the searches were conducted by Singh, an Enforcement Officer, Alok Pankaj (now deceased), and others. According to the complainant, Singh and Pankaj had allegedly threatened to arrest the complainant’s son, who was not at home, and said that the son could be destroying evidence and therefore they would take him to Delhi after arresting him. Singh had allegedly told the complainant thereafter that he would have to shell out ₹25 lakh to ensure that his son did not get arrested. Singh allegedly reduced the demand to ₹20 lakh when the complainant expressed his inability to pay ₹25 lakh.
As part of its probe, the CBI had allegedly found elements of classic hawala operation in the arrangements devised by the accused for the handover of the ₹20 lakh bribe in cash to him in South Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar, by representatives of the Mumbai-based jeweller: a currency note of ₹20 with its unique serial number, a contact phone number that was not in regular use, and details of the bribe amount. Singh had allegedly asked the complainant to send the bribe sum to Delhi via a hawala operator/ angadia with the serial number of a ₹20 note as the token/identifier for the scheduled bribe-handover transaction to go ahead. Since the complainant did not want to pay the bribe, however, he approached the CBI on August 6. The CBI arrested Singh during a post-trap proceeding early on August 8 in the presence of two independent witnesses. All Indian currency notes have a unique serial number, which is a combination of both letters and numerals.
{{/usCountry}}As part of its probe, the CBI had allegedly found elements of classic hawala operation in the arrangements devised by the accused for the handover of the ₹20 lakh bribe in cash to him in South Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar, by representatives of the Mumbai-based jeweller: a currency note of ₹20 with its unique serial number, a contact phone number that was not in regular use, and details of the bribe amount. Singh had allegedly asked the complainant to send the bribe sum to Delhi via a hawala operator/ angadia with the serial number of a ₹20 note as the token/identifier for the scheduled bribe-handover transaction to go ahead. Since the complainant did not want to pay the bribe, however, he approached the CBI on August 6. The CBI arrested Singh during a post-trap proceeding early on August 8 in the presence of two independent witnesses. All Indian currency notes have a unique serial number, which is a combination of both letters and numerals.
{{/usCountry}}After Singh’s arrest by CBI’s anti-corruption branch, the ED had also registered a money laundering case against Singh. The ED had suspended Singh and taken steps for his repatriation to his parent cadre, the Income-Tax Department. ED had said Singh’s residence had been searched and his office was jointly searched by CBI and ED. “Sandeep Singh, assistant director, ED, was trapped by CBI Mumbai in New Delhi along with ₹20 lakh cash which he had allegedly extorted from an individual under investigation by ED to favour him in the case. Taking immediate cognisance of this incident and following the policy of zero tolerance towards corruption, ED has initiated criminal action against Singh under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act,” an ED source had then said.
The CBI had on August 7 registered a case against Singh under section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act (demand of any undue advantage by a public servant) and section 61(2)(a) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita that pertains to criminal conspiracy. During the probe, the CBI allegedly did not find any role of the EO in the case, during his questioning, and so did not arrest him or proceed against him.
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