Delhi court sends alleged Hawala dealer Naresh Jain to judicial custody in money laundering case
Sep 14, 2020
New Delhi [India], September 14 : A Delhi court on Monday sent Naresh Jain, an alleged Hawala dealer, to judicial custody till September 28 for his role in connection with a money laundering case related to international hawala transactions.
Additional Session Judge Rajesh Malik sent Jain to judicial custody till September 28 as the Enforcement Directorate (ED) did not seek further remand. He was produced before the court through video conferencing.
Jain was earlier in the custody of the ED for questioning in the matter. Special Public Prosecutor advocate Naveen Kumar Matta represented Enforcement Directorate in the court today.
The counsel for the ED had earlier submitted that further custodial remand of the accused shall be essential to ascertain the quantum of proceeds of crime as investigation in the present case is in progress.
Accused formed shell companies and rotated funds approximately to the tune of Rs 96,000 crores in furtherance of the criminal conspiracy to cause loss to the government exchequer by indulging in illegal foreign exchange transactions on the basis of forged and fabricated documents, the counsel had submitted.
According to a press release, ED had begun an investigation in the matter under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) on the basis of an FIR filed by Economic Offences Wing (EOW), and others.
"The investigations so far revealed that Jain along with his accomplices allegedly hatched a criminal conspiracy to forge/ fabricate documents in order to cause loss to the government exchequer by indulging in illegal foreign exchange transactions," ED had said in a statement.
"Documents like identity proof, birth and education certificates, voter IDs, PAN cards and signatures were forged or fabricated to incorporate entities, operating bank accounts, facilitating bogus/over-invoiced/under-invoiced import and export transactions and rotation of the funds through a web of shell companies to cause undue benefit to the parties involved and loss to the government exchequer," it had added.
The economic offences watchdog had also claimed that Jain allegedly facilitated Hawala operation of Rs 11,800 crores approximately in 114 foreign bank account.
It has also been revealed that 450 shell companies have been used to rotate funds to the tune of approximately Rs 96,000 crores for providing accommodation entries of approximately Rs 18,680 crores to more than 970 beneficiaries, the ED had said.
