The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday carried out fresh raids on multiple premises linked to I-PAC, the election consultant of the Trinamul Congress, in connection with alleged coal smuggling in Bengal.
Sources in the EC said the raids started in the morning at Hyderabad, Bengaluru, Mumbai and Delhi as part of the agency’s ongoing probe into the alleged scam.
“The raids are being undertaken under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). The premises of I-PAC co-founder and director Rishi Raj Singh in Bengaluru and Vijay Nair in Mumbai are among those being raided,” said an ED official.
Nair, the official said, is one of the executives of the political consultancy firm and a former Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) communication in-charge.
In January, the agency raided the offices of I-PAC in Calcutta and the residence of its founder Pratik Jain. The agency then claimed that the action was obstructed by chief minister Mamata Banerjee and top state police officers, who took away the evidence, including electronic devices seized by it.
Mamata had accused the ED of attempting to seize her party's internal data and
election strategy ahead of the Assembly polls during searches.
The Supreme Court is currently hearing the matter where ED has sought action against Mamata Banerjee, including a CBI probe.
Rishi Raj Singh and Pratik Jain, who were recently summoned by the ED to record their statements, have approached the Delhi High Court to quash these notices issued to them, citing ongoing election work in Bengal and Tamil Nadu.
The ED case is based on a November 2020 FIR of the CBI that alleged a multi-crore rupee coal pilferage scam related to Eastern Coalfields Limited mines in Bengal’s Asansol.
The agency had said in a statement that a hawala operator linked to this alleged coal smuggling ring had facilitated transactions of tens of crores of rupees to Indian PAC Consulting Pvt. Ltd, the registered company of I-PAC.
“I-PAC is also one of the entities linked to hawala money,” the ED had alleged.
The agency has claimed that about ₹20 crore of hawala funds, generated from alleged coal pilferage in Bengal, found its way to I-PAC.
The organisation has been providing political consultancy to Trinamool since 2021, said the ED official.
Sources said the ₹20 crore ‘hawala’ funds were moved by a Mumbai-based ‘Angadiya’ firm that got into the crosshairs of the agency during its probe into the Delhi liquor ‘scam’ case involving the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).