Hasan Ali case: ED summons Congress leader

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday summoned Amlendu Pandey — the Congress leader from Bihar — for allegedly helping Pune businessman Hasan Ali Khan in seeking a second passport from Patna passport office.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday summoned Amlendu Pandey — the Congress leader from Bihar — for allegedly helping Pune businessman Hasan Ali Khan in seeking a second passport from Patna passport office. Pandey is likely to appear before the central agency on April 14.

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According to the ED’s application, the agency wants to confront Khan in Pandey’s presence “to unearth the transactions undertaken by Khan in Singapore and the reasons for obtaining the second passport from Patna passport office.”

“In respect of passport obtained from Patna passport office, investigations revealed that the same had been obtained on the basis of fabricated/ forged documents with the help of Amlendu Kumar Pandey from Delhi who had also travelled with Khan and Kashinath Tapuriah to Singapore via Kathmandu to avoid immigration checks,” the ED stated in its remand application seeking the extension of Khan’s judicial custody.

Additional sessions Judge SR Malpani-Pawar extended Khan’s judicial custody till Wednesday. Pandey had contested the recent elections for Bihar’s legislative council and lost.

He was the spokesperson of the Congress Bihar unit during the assembly elections last year.

A team of ED officials had, on March 23, raided his Delhi residence and had found incriminating documents pertaining to the case.

The ED application further stated: “Khan has admitted that he had been dealing with antique jewellery belonging to the Nizam family of Hyderabad and had earned about Rs40-50 lakh from buying and selling the antique pieces.”

The ED sought to probe the source of the said antiques, the application added.

The ED also wants to confront Khan over the statements made by his alleged aides — Tapuriah and Philip Anandraj — about his locker in the UBS bank in Zurich that reportedly contained antique jewellery.