Mehul Choksi's Assets Worth Rs 1,271-Crore Seized, Including 15 Flats, Mall, Farmhouse & More
The attached properties include 15 flats, 17 office premises in Mumbai and M/s Hyderabad Gems SEZ in Andhra Pradesh.
Mumbai, March 1: Amid mounting trouble for diamond billionaire Mehul Choksi, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday seized properties worth Rs 1217.20 crore in connection with the Punjab National Bank (PNB) fraud. As per reports, the Enforcement Directorate informed that it has seized 41 properties of the Gitanjali Gems promoter.
The attached properties include 15 flats, 17 office premises in Mumbai and M/s Hyderabad Gems SEZ in Andhra Pradesh. As per reports by ANI, the seized properties also include a shopping mall in Kolkata, farm house in Alibaug and 231 acres land in Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. A 170-acre park in Hyderabad's Ranga Reddy district valued at over Rs. 500 crore has also been attached.
Celebrity jeweller Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi are being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate and other investigative agencies ever since the PNB scam came to light. On Wednesday, the CBI had written an email to Nirav Modi on his official id asking him to join investigations.
In his reply, Modi said that he will be unable to join the investigations owing to business abroad. The CBI sent him another mail asking him to contact the High Commission of the concerned country, for travelling back to India and made it mandatory for him to appear before the agency by next week.
A Lookout Notice/ Blue Corner Notice has been issued against Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi separately by the Bureau of Immigration, New Delhi in connection with multi-crore Punjab National Bank fraud case. According to IT sources, the Lookout Notice/Blue Corner Notice would be valid for one year from the date of issue 22.02.2018 at all ports of embarkation. The Income Tax Department has further attached four more properties of Nirav Modi which includes a farmhouse at Mumbai’s Alibag worth Rs 13 crore and 5.24 MW Solar Power Plant with 135 acres of land at Karjat, Ahmednagar worth Rs. 70 crore as per books.
Earlier, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had said that the Punjab National Bank (PNB) reported scam of Rs. 1251 crore by Gitanjali Gems. In a statement the CBI had said that the PNB had informed the agency that further scam of Rs 1,251 crore has been detected in respect to Gitanjali Gems. Reports state that the CBI is now probing Rs 12,636 crore in the PNB scam, up from Rs 11,421 crore.
Earlier this week, a Mumbai Court issued summons to Nirav to appear before it on March 12 in connection with the scam. The court made it clear that if Modi fails to appear before it, then a Non-Bailable Warrant (NBW) will be issued against him. The Punjab National Bank detected a billion dollar scam earlier this month, in which Nirav Modi acquired fraudulent letters of undertaking from one of its branches for overseas credit from other Indian lenders. As per details available, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) provisionally attached 21 immovable properties, worth Rs 523.72 crore, of Nirav Modi and companies controlled by him.
(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Mar 01, 2018 04:54 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).