The ED on Monday said it has secured police custody of Bhupinder Singh alias Honey, nephew of Punjab CM Charanjit Singh Channi, till Tuesday in a money laundering case connected to illegal sand mining.
“ED has arrested Bhupinder Singh S/o Santokh Singh under PMLA,2002 in a case connected with illegal sand mining. Court has granted ED custody of accused till 08.02.2022,” the agency said in a tweet.
Honey was arrested under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) late on Thursday night after several hours of questioning at the agency's office in Jalandhar.
During the questioning, he was evasive in his replies, leading to his arrest. The ED then produced him before the relevant PMLA court on Friday that granted him to ED custody till Tuesday.
Honey is the son of Channi's sister-in-law.
On January 18, the agency had searched his premises and claimed to have seized about Rs 8 crore in cash and "incriminating" documents. Properties of a few others linked to the case were also searched, they said.
Following the searches in January, the agency had recovered over Rs 10 crore in cash and several documents, of which Rs 8 crore and most of the papers were seized from premises linked to Honey alone.
About Rs 2 crore cash was seized from the premises linked to a person identified as Sandeep Kumar.
The ED filed a criminal case under PMLA in this case in November.
The case is based on a 2018 FIR at the Shaheed Bhagat Singh (SBS) Nagar police station that pressed charges under the Indian Penal Code and Mines and Minerals (Regulation of Development) Act, 1957.