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ED issues fresh summons to Anil Deshmukh in extortion and money laundering case
The ED has claimed that its probe suggests that Deshmukh misused his position as Maharashtra home minister, and through assistant police inspector Sachin Vaze, who has now been dismissed, collected ₹4.7 crore from Mumbai’s bars for their “smooth functioning”.
A day after the Supreme Court refused to grant any interim relief to former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh and his son Hrishikesh in a corruption-cum-extortion probe, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) asked him to appear at the agency’s South Mumbai office on Wednesday. This is the fifth summons issued to the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader.
ED registered a money laundering case against Deshmukh after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed an FIR against him on April 21 following former Mumbai police chief Param Bir Singh’s allegation—levelled in March this year—that Deshmukh had directed a police officer to extort ₹100 crore a month from Mumbai’s hotels and bars. Deshmukh has denied all allegations against him multiple times.
The ED has claimed that its probe suggests that Deshmukh misused his position as Maharashtra home minister, 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”.
The agency adds that this money was later, through hawala channels, sent to two brothers in Delhi who operated bogus companies and later diverted the money as donations to Nagpur-based Shri Sai Shikshan Sansthan, an educational trust controlled by the Deshmukhs.
ED has also claimed that while collecting money from the bar owners, Sachin Vaze told them that a part of the amount was to go to an entity—‘No 1’—as well as the crime and social service branches of the Mumbai Police.
The anti-money laundering agency has also said that Vaze told ED that he was called to Deshmukh’s official residence and directed to collect ₹3 lakh from every bar and restaurant in the city. He was also given a list of the establishments.
ED claims to have identified 24 private entities that are controlled by the Deshmukh family and says they made huge monetary transactions without much rationale.
“From the analysis of the bank accounts of these companies, it is clear that there is no rationale for the transfers, and 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 had stated.
The agency then arrested Deshmukh’s personal secretary Sanjeev Palande and assistant Kundan Shinde on June 26, claiming their role in laundering of money on Deshmukh’s directions.
In mid-July, the anti-money laundering agency 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.
ED said its investigation has revealed that the Worli flat was purchased by the NCP leader in 2004 by making cash payment. It was registered in the name of Deshmukh’s wife Aarti, but the sale deed for the flat was registered in February 2020 after he became the home minister.
The other seized properties, too, are held in Aarti’s name as well as in the name of Premier Port Links Pvt Ltd. According to ED officers, the Deshmukhs acquired 50% ownership in M/s Premier Port Links Pvt Ltd, including its assets (land and shops) valued around ₹5.34 crore (book value) by merely paying ₹17.95 lakh, that too after a substantial gap.
Deshmukh has, however, maintained that the case against him was a classic example of a political witch hunt. He has said that the allegations levelled by former Mumbai police chief Param Bir Singh cropped up only after the cop was shunted out over his poor handling of the Antilia and the Hiran murder cases.
