The Enforcement Directorate (ED) launched a series of coordinated raids on Monday morning at approximately ten locations across India linked to former Samajwadi Party (SP) MLA Vinay Shankar Tiwari. The searches spanned cities including Gorakhpur, Lucknow, Noida, and Mumbai, targeting properties associated with Tiwari and his family. Tiwari, who previously represented the Chillupar assembly constituency, has been under investigation for his alleged involvement in a significant bank fraud case. His company, Gangotri Enterprises Limited, is accused of fraudulently securing credit facilities amounting to Rs 1,129.44 crore from a consortium of seven banks led by the Bank of India. Investigations reveal that these funds were misappropriated and siphoned off, resulting in a wrongful loss of approximately Rs 754.24 crore to the banks.
The ED’s actions are rooted in an FIR filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against Gangotri Enterprises and its key figures, including Tiwari, his wife Reeta Tiwari, and associate Ajeet Pandey.
The CBI’s probe uncovered that between 2012 and 2016, the company, in collusion with its promoters and directors, engaged in fraudulent activities to obtain substantial credit facilities, which were subsequently diverted in violation of banking norms.
In November 2023, the ED had provisionally attached 27 immovable properties valued at Rs 72.08 crore, registered under the names of Tiwari, his family members, and relatives.
These properties, located in Uttar Pradesh’s Lucknow, Maharajganj, and Gorakhpur districts, were linked to the alleged bank fraud.
Further intensifying the probe, the ED conducted searches in February 2024 at ten premises across Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat, and Haryana, uncovering incriminating documents related to properties acquired using the siphoned funds.