ED arrests Surendranagar official in Gujarat, says found ₹67 lakh cash at home

The Gujarat government transferred Surendranagar district collector Rajendrakumar Patel after deputy mamlatdar Chandrasinh Mori’s arrest by ED

Published on: Dec 24, 2025, 22:26:35 IST

By Maulik Pathak

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AHMEDABAD: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has arrested a revenue officer in the Surendranagar collectorate for alleged money laundering linked to corruption in land-use permissions, and seized ₹67.50 lakh in cash from his residence, according to a remand application before a special PMLA court in Ahmedabad on Wednesday.

A special PMLA court remanded deputy mamlatdar Chandrasinh Mori in ED custody till January 1. (Getty Images/iStockphoto)

The court remanded him in ED custody till January 1.

The accused, Chandrasinh Mori, was posted as a deputy mamlatdar (equivalent to a tehsildar) and executive magistrate in the Surendranagar collectorate and entrusted with the verification and processing of applications under the Saurashtra Ghar Khed Tenancy Settlement and Agricultural Lands Ordinance, 1949.

ED told the court that his official position enabled Mori to control the pace and outcome of applications relating to change of land use and allied statutory permissions.

Mori was arrested on the night of December 23 in Surendranagar.

On Wednesday evening, the district collector Rajendrakumar Patel was also removed from the post and not given a fresh assignment. An order by the General Administration Department (GAD) said Patel’s services had been “placed at the disposal of GAD until further orders”. District Development Officer KS Yagnik will temporarily hold additional charge as the collector.

The ED action follows a first information report (FIR) registered by the Anti-Corruption Bureau on December 23 under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Since these offences are scheduled offences under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, the agency registered an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) and initiated a parallel investigation.

The remand note stated that Mori allegedly demanded and collected bribes as “speed money” to expedite applications, with amounts fixed and calculated on a per-square-metre basis. The agency claimed payments were routed through intermediaries whose details were recorded by the accused.

During searches conducted under PMLA, cash amounting to ₹67.50 lakh was seized from the accused’s bedroom. ED claimed that Mori admitted in his statement that the cash represented bribe money collected directly and through middlemen from applicants seeking favourable or faster processing of land-use matters.

The agency also alleged that Mori had generated proceeds of crime exceeding ₹1 crore through abuse of his official position and that properties acquired from such proceeds were yet to be identified.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Maulik Pathak
He is an Ahmedabad-based journalist with more than two decades of experience. His career spans business journalism and general news, with reporting across politics, crime, governance, public policy, business, industry, infrastructure, energy, ports, aviation, the environment, wildlife and social issues. He began his career in feature writing before moving into business journalism, reporting on companies and sectors including energy, infrastructure, pharmaceuticals, automobiles and real estate. Over the years, his work expanded to politics, courts, crime, public policy, civic affairs, the environment and wildlife. His reporting has taken him from government offices and courtrooms to factory floors, ports, forests and remote villages, covering stories that range from industrial investments and financial markets to elections, conservation and issues affecting everyday life. While many assignments demand the pace of the daily news cycle, others require sustained reporting over months and years to follow developments beyond the headlines. He started his journalism career with the Asian Age in Ahmedabad in 2002 as a feature writer and sub-editor. Since 2022, he has been working with Hindustan Times. Earlier, he worked with Business Standard, DNA, The Economic Times, Mint and The Times of India. His longest stint was with Mint, where he spent more than eight years reporting across multiple beats. During his career, he has worked in both reporting and editing roles, contributing to page planning, local editions and special editorial projects as newsrooms evolved from print-first operations to digital publishing. Early in his career, he also worked on media and documentary projects with an NGO and as a copywriter at a communications agency before returning to journalism. Away from work, he sometimes makes time for a pair of binoculars, table tennis, cinema and the occasional poem.Read More

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