ED files charge sheet against Anil Deshmukh’s personal assistant, private secy

The agency arrested Palande and Shinde on June 26, claiming they handled the money laundering linked to Deshmukh’s alleged bribe-cum-extortion business. Both have been charged with relevant sections of PMLA. ED said in the past that the two were not cooperating with the agency

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Monday filed a charge sheet against former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh’s personal secretary Sanjeev Palande and personal assistant Kundan Shinde in the special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court. Deshmukh is the main accused in the money laundering case.

Home minister Anil Deshmukh. (HT archive)

The agency arrested Palande and Shinde on June 26, claiming they handled the money laundering linked to Deshmukh’s alleged bribe-cum-extortion business. Both have been charged with relevant sections of PMLA. ED said in the past that the two were not cooperating with the agency.

The money laundering case against Deshmukh and his aides was registered after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a first information report (FIR) against him on April 21.

The central agency alleged that while serving as the home minister, Deshmukh misused his position, and through assistant police inspector Sachin Vaze – who has now been dismissed and is in Taloja jail for his alleged role in the Antilia explosives scare and Mansukh Hiran murder cases – collected ₹4.7 crore from Mumbai’s bars for their “smooth functioning”.

Later, through hawala channels, this money was sent to two brothers in Delhi who operated bogus companies, said the agency. It claimed that on Deskmukh’s son Hrishikesh’s behest, the two brothers diverted the money as donations to Nagpur-based Shri Sai Shikshan Sansthan, an educational trust controlled by the Deshmukhs.

ED alleged that both Palande and Shinde played an important role in circulating and laundering the unaccounted money.

During investigation, ED identified 24 private entities that are controlled by the Deshmukh family and found that huge sums of money were transacted among them without any rationale. “...thus it can be said that these series of transactions were meant for inflating balance sheets and layering of money from one company to other,” ED said.

In mid-July, the anti-money laundering agency has provisionally attached Deshmukh’s properties worth ₹4.2 crore. The attached assets include a residential flat in Worli valued at ₹1.54 crore and 25 land parcels of book value ₹2.67 crore at Dhutum village at Uran in the neighbouring Raigad district.

Praful Patel visits ED office

Senior Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Praful Patel visited the Enforcement Directorate (ED) office on Monday. After visiting the ED office in the afternoon, he said he was called to sign documents in case of a property seizure. “I was there to sign documents as ED had seized a property of Ceejay House building a few years ago, which is owned by someone else. As the building is in our possession I was called to sign some documents. There’s nothing else,” the former aviation minister said.