A Chartered Accountant has been arrested here by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in Delhi in connection with a money laundering case arising out of a Rs 3,269.42 crore bank loan fraud case against Shakti Bhog Foods Ltd.
Raman Bhuraria was arrested on Friday for his "assistance and complicity" in the alleged fraud after a court rejected his anticipatory bail. Searches were also conducted at several premises linked to Bhuraria.
He was produced before a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court that sent him to custody till August 20.
During the searches, the ED said, various documents and digital evidence have been recovered.
"The allegations against the accused (Bhuraria) include his active assistance and involvement in the bank fraud by way of round tripping through related entities. Siphoning off the funds was being done through fictitious sale and purchase through various dummy and other entities," the ED claimed.
In July, the ED had arrested Shakti Bhog Foods Ltd Chairman and Managing Director Kewal Krishan Kumar in the case.
The ED had filed a money laundering case against Shakti Bhog Foods Ltd following a CBI FIR that charged the company and others for criminal conspiracy, cheating and criminal misconduct.
The CBI had registered the FIR following investigations into a complaint filed by the SBI claiming that the Directors of the company allegedly falsified accounts and forged documents to siphon off public funds.
Over its long history, the SBI said in its complaint, the company has usually ventured only into related diversification and increased its product portfolio only in the food processing sector. This helped the company grow organically over the past decade and its turnover grew from Rs 1,411.87 crore in 2008 to Rs 6,000 crore by 2013-14, the SBI had said.
However, the account turned into a Non-Performing Asset (NPA) and it was declared a fraud in 2019.
(Published 14 August 2021, 09:42 IST)
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