ED raids Deshmukh’s 2 houses in Nagpur in ₹100-crore extortion case
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Sunday raided former state home minister Anil Deshmukh’s ancestral house in Wadvihira and Katol in Nagpur district in connection with the alleged ₹100-crore extortion case
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Sunday raided former state home minister Anil Deshmukh’s ancestral house in Wadvihira and Katol in Nagpur district in connection with the alleged ₹100-crore extortion case.
The central investigative agency had on Friday provisionally attached the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader’s assets worth ₹4.20 crore in a money laundering case.
A team of six to eight ED officers, accompanied by a team of armed Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel, reached the two houses around 7am on Sunday and started a search operation, which continued till 2pm. Both the houses were cordoned off by CRPF jawans.
ED, which joined the investigation, last month arrested Deshmukh’s aides Kundan Shinde and Sanjeev Palande, and summoned Deshmukh and his family members.
Deshmukh or his close relatives were not present in the houses at Katol and Wadvihira at the time of the raid, following which ED officers reportedly interrogated one Pankaj Deshmukh, diwan of Deshmukh family, and seized several documents.
ED had also raided Deshmukh’s Civil Lines residence here last month and interrogated his wife Aarti and son Rishi.
ED officers refused to divulge details of the investigation.
Two days ago on Friday, one residential flat owned by Deshmukh in Mumbai’s Worli valued at ₹1.54 crore, and 25 land parcels in Dhutum village in Raigad district of Maharashtra with a book value of ₹2.67 crore were attached by the ED. The agency then also issued summons to his wife Aarti Deshmukh for questioning.
Former Mumbai Police commissioner Param Bir Singh had alleged that as a minister in the Maharashtra government, Deshmukh had asked suspended police officer Sachin Vaze and few others to extort ₹100 crore every month from bars and restaurants in Mumbai.
Following the allegations, the Bombay high court (HC) ordered a preliminary enquiry by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). The agency later registered a first information report (FIR) against Deshmukh in April this year.