In a joint international crackdown on a sophisticated international money laundering network, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday arrested three alleged hawala operatives and seized
Rs78 lakh in cash following searches in the national Capital and Amritsar.
The agency launched the operation following a request from the Australian Federal Police (AFP). A slew of Australian agencies have carried out simultaneous raids there in Clearview and Ingle Farm, lyndhurst, Templestowe, St Albans, Thomastown and East Melbourne (Victoria), among others.The ED raided nine locations in Delhi and Amritsar and the three persons were arrested under the criminal provisions of the money laundering Act. The agency will soon attach a number of bank accounts relating to the accused persons as they are suspected to have stashed illegal money in those accounts. Those arrested include P S Arora and Gagandeep Singh from Amritsar and Gaurav Gupta from Delhi, for offences under the provisions of the Prevention of Money laundering Act (PMlA).
The arrested persons allegedly were into “trade-based” money laundering racket across the globe and the kingpins were based in Amritsar.”
The AFP had approached the ED through diplomatic channels a few days back. A special team from the Delhi headquarters of ED carried out the operation about which the Australian authorities have been informed,” the sources said.A team of 30 ED sleuths camped in Jalandhar and travelled to Amritsar to conduct the raids. The suspects of the syndicate were allegedly generating crores of rupees through drugs trade using illegal payment gateways including hawala networks to route the black money thus generated, the sources added.