New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate Thursday raided the workplace of political consultancy agency Indian Political Motion Committee (I-PAC) and the Kolkata home of its head Pratik Jain as a part of investigation into alleged hawala fund transfers in a coal smuggling case, ThePrint has learnt.

The raids had been half of a bigger operation concentrating on roughly 10 places in Kolkata and Delhi, sources stated.

The nephew of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and the TMC’s nationwide common secretary, Abhishek Banerjee, alongside together with his spouse had been earlier summoned for questioning in the identical case.

CM Banerjee rushed to Jain’s Loudon Avenue residence shortly after studies of the raids emerged, alleging that the company was trying to gather details about her get together’s actions and plans. West Bengal is about to go to polls this 12 months.

“I rang up Pratik, he’s in command of my get together. I’ve collected the get together file. ED is attempting to get particulars of all our get together actions and plans,” Banerjee stated outdoors Jain’s residence.

“They’re attempting to get the candidate checklist and our inner info. Is it the responsibility of ED and Amit Shah (Union Dwelling Minister)? See, I obtained this, the file and the arduous drive. What if I raid the BJP get together workplace? What would be the fallout?” she stated, displaying a inexperienced file she stated got here from inside Jain’s home.

ED sources denied accumulating any knowledge on political events or candidates. “No such knowledge has been collected or retrieved from the premises underneath search, and neither is that our goal. The topic’s function has emerged in the course of the investigation, and the search motion has been initiated solely after the function of Jain emerged in hawala transfers operating into tens of crores in the course of the investigation within the ongoing coal smuggling case,” an ED official informed ThePrint.

Moreover, an ED spokesperson stated the searches had been occurring peacefully until the CM arrived together with law enforcement officials at Jain’s residence. 

She, the spokesperson stated, “took away key proof, together with bodily paperwork and digital gadgets”.

“The CM’s convoy then proceeded to I-PAC’s workplace premises, from the place Ms. Banerjee, her aides, and the state police personnel forcibly eliminated bodily paperwork and digital proof,” the spokesperson stated, alleging that this amounted to obstruction within the probe.

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ED’s probe stems from a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) case towards Anup Majee and several other Japanese Coalfield Restricted officers on allegations of unlawful coal excavation and theft in leasehold areas in West Bengal. This coal was later offered at varied factories/crops in Bankura, Bardhaman, Purulia and different districts of the state.

Based mostly on CBI’s FIR, filed in November 2020, ED launched a cash laundering investigation and allegedly discovered that the coal smuggling syndicate illegally excavated roughly 25.51 lakh metric tonnes (MT) of coal price round Rs 1,114.35 crore.

The company has alleged that the syndicate led by Majee constructed an organised gang that carried out large-scale unlawful coal mining utilizing heavy mining equipment, earth movers and explosives underneath the safety and patronage of influential individuals within the space.

The syndicates allegedly paid bribes to public servants and different influential individuals who patronised the unlawful mining enterprise. “The proceeds of crime had been additionally transferred abroad within the financial institution accounts of people having shut household ties with individuals having political clout,” the company alleged in earlier courtroom filings on the case.

Requested in regards to the alleged hyperlink with IPAC, the ED spokesperson stated a hawala operator who handled proceeds of crime within the coal smuggling case additionally handed on “tens of crores of rupees” to political consultancy agency. 

(Edited by Prerna Madan)

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