The Enforcement Directorate conducted searches on Thursday at about 35 locations in Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, and Nagpur. as part of an investigation into allegations of money laundering involving a company and its promoters accused of committing a bank loan fraud exceeding Rs 20,000 crore, officials sources said.
Authorities are currently conducting raids on the Amtek Group and its directors, such as Arvind Dham, Gautam Malhotra, and others. According to sources, these raids are targeting approximately 35 business and residential locations in Delhi, Gurugram, Noida, Mumbai, and Nagpur since this morning.
According to sources, the investigation originated from a CBI FIR against ACIL Limited, a group entity of Amtek. The allegations involve a bank fraud exceeding Rs 20,000 crore within several listed companies. These companies were subsequently acquired through NCLT proceedings at a nominal price, resulting in minimal recovery for the consortium of banks involved.
The Supreme Court too had sought an ED probe, the sources said.
This, as per the ED, led to a loss of about Rs 10,000-Rs 15,000 crore to the exchequer, the sources said.
The ED believes that loan funds were “siphoned off” to invest in real estate, foreign investment and investment in new ventures.
Bogus sales, capital assets, debtors and profit were shown in group concerns to get more loans so that it doesnt get non-performing assets (NPA) tag, the sources said.
It is alleged that the shares of listed companies were “rigged”, books of account were window dressed for obtaining higher loans through collusion of auditors/professionals.
Thousands of crores of assets have been allegedly parked in the name of shell companies, a number of foreign assets have been created and money is still parked under the new names through benami directors and shareholders, the ED found.