Three Delhi PFI leaders sent to judicial custody by special court
Sep 30, 2022
New Delhi [India], September 30 : A Special Court of Delhi on Friday sent three Delhi PFI leaders namely Perwez Ahmad, Mohammad Ilias and Abdul Muqeet to judicial custody.
All three namely, Perwez Ahmad, President PFI Delhi; Mohammad Ilias, General Secretary PFI Delhi; and Abdul Muqeet, Office Secretary PFI Delhi were arrested last week by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in the offence of money laundering in the guise of cash donations.
The Additional Sessions Judge (ASJ) Shailender Malik on Friday gave the order to send all three accused to Judicial Custody for 14 days after ED didn't seek further custodial remand of them.
All three accused were produced before the court on Friday after the end of the seven-day remand, which was granted last week by the same court.
Enforcement Directorate (ED) earlier had alleged that Perwez Ahmad was part of a criminal conspiracy since 2018.
"He admitted to having looked after the collection of funds in Delhi. Investigation revealed that such fund collection exercise was a sham and was falsely projected to be received from PFI sympathizers whereas statements of individuals, projected as contributors, revealed that these transactions were bogus. Hence, cash from suspicious sources was nothing but proceeds of crime generated out of criminal conspiracy," ED stated.
"The non-cooperative and evasive attitude of Perwez Ahmad along with his deliberate attempts to avoid joining the ongoing investigation in light of the fresh evidence viz. the statement of so-called donors and the evidence seized from various locations during searches, in this case, create further suspicion about his activities and involvement in money laundering activities," ED further stated.
"It is evident that Perwez Ahmad deliberately withheld disclosure of true facts and deliberately lied and tried to mislead the investigating officer during the recording of his statements under Section 50 of PMLA, 2002," said the ED in court.
ED earlier stated that the PMLA investigation against PFI in a matter registered in 2018 revealed that more than Rs 120 crores has been deposited in the accounts of PFI and related entities over the years and that a very large part of the same has been deposited in cash.
According to the ED, it has recently found inputs against the PFI for "organizing a training camp with an intent to cause disturbance during Prime Minster Narendra Modi's visit in Bihar's capital Patna on July 12 this year".
Besides, during the course of the investigation, the agencies have found details of numerous bank accounts of PFI.
The revelation came in two separate remand copies of the Enforcement Directorate, one submitted before a special judge in Lucknow against Muhammed Shafeeque Payeth, a resident of Kozhikode in Kerala, and the other against Perwez Ahmed before a Special Court in Delhi.
Both Payeth and Ahmed were arrested from Kerala and Delhi respectively on September 22 during the largest search operation conducted by a joint team of ED and the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and state police forces, arresting 106 PFI members from 15 states.
