ED officer’s arrest: CBI probe finds elements of classic hawala operation
A currency note of ₹20 with its unique serial number, a contact phone number that is not in regular use, and details of a bribe amount – these tale-tell elements of a classic hawala transaction were allegedly part of the arrangements devised by an ED officer for taking bribe
MUMBAI: A currency note of ₹20 with its unique serial number, a contact phone number that is not in regular use, and details of a bribe amount – these tale-tell elements of a classic hawala transaction were allegedly part of the arrangements devised by an official of the Delhi Unit of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for handover of a ₹20 lakh bribe in cash to him on Wednesday evening in South Delhi’s Lajpat Nagar, by representatives of a Mumbai-based jeweller.
However, little did he know that a day before the scheduled transaction, the jeweller had alerted the Mumbai unit of the CBI (Central Bureau of Investigation) about the bribery demand, and the agency’s men were lying in wait for him, to catch him red-handed.
On August 4, the jeweller’s Mumbai residence had been searched by the ED official as part of the agency’s money-laundering investigation, and the bribe demand was also made that day, purportedly to prevent the arrest of his son. And what followed was the elaborate plan to hand over the bribe amount in the bustling lanes of Lajpat Nagar.
The CBI Mumbai’s anti-corruption branch picked up the accused ED official, assistant director Sandeep Singh, from a location in Lajpat Nagar on Wednesday for allegedly accepting a ₹20 lakh bribe from the jeweller - its case’s complainant - as part of an anti-corruption operation that saw the use of typical hawala mode by the accused for effecting the transaction. Agency sources said that the accused official had communicated to the jeweller that at the time of the bribe handover in Delhi, the details of a particular ₹20 currency note would be an identifier for the transaction to go ahead. All Indian currency notes have a unique serial number, which is a combination of both letters and numerals.
The accused official had also given a contact phone number, on which he was to be alerted before the handover of the bribe on Wednesday evening, the sources said. CBI found out that the number was not in regular use and could have been used on specific occasions only by the accused official.
Singh was remanded to CBI’s custody by a Mumbai special court on Friday till August 14. The ED on Thursday said it has suspended Singh and taken steps for his repatriation to his parent cadre, Income Tax (I-T) Department. ED sources said, “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 Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) was registered against him and a search operation was conducted at his residence on Thursday to gather evidence of his criminal activities. His office was also jointly searched by CBI and ED, the sources said.
Singh allegedly demanded bribe from the complainant while conducting a search at the latter’s Mumbai premises on August 4. He had posed as the investigating officer of an ED money-laundering probe into an investment fraud involving some apps, including Power Bank, Tesla Power Bank and Ezplan. “He had conducted a search merely as the Search Warrant Authorised Officer,” ED sources said. The complainant’s firm was suspected to be part of the money-laundering aspect of the case due to which the search was carried out.
CBI’s sources also said that its bribery operation is part of several such operations that they have undertaken upon receiving information and complaints from members of the public, a result of their ‘anti-corruption awareness campaigns’ in Maharashtra that encourage people to report instances of corruption to the agency on its dedicated contact number/email address ( 8433700000, 022-26543700, sp1acmum@cbi.gov.in).
In the case of the arrested ED officer too, the information could reach CBI due to its ‘Join Hands in the Fight against Corruption’ campaign, the sources said. On July 6, a month before the jeweller’s complaint to the agency, the CBI officers had conducted a meeting under the anti-corruption campaign with some representatives of Mumbai’s jewellery-bullion trade at Zaveri Bazaar.