When bad luck strikes, there is no limiting the excess bagagge. This is proving to be true for former UP cabinet minister Babu Singh Kushwaha presently doing time in the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) scam.
On Wednesday, an Enforcement Directorate (ED) team which was probing money laundering charges against Kushwaha, seized immovable properties worth about Rs 200 crore. Earlier the ED had seized his property worth over Rs 4.25 crore in Gomati Nagar in 2014.
Sources in the ED confirmed that after the probe pointed that Kushwaha had earned property is in his partner Saurabh Jain’s name, one of his flats at Kasmanda House, Hazratganj had been seized, another one in the name of Mercantile Darpan owned by Naveen Gupta also in Kasmanda, an office of BJ Entertainment at lACCFED building on Kabir Road, along with a three-storied shopping complex on Pusa Road at Karolbagh, New Delhi. Some luxury vehicles were also seized by the ED. The extimated worth of the seized properties made by ED on Wednesday is over Rs 200 crore.
Earlier ED had registered Enforcement Case Information Report against Kushwaha and 14 others. The CBI had also registered 15 separate cases regarding NRHM scam.
Information about Kushwaha’s property which has been collected so far included Axis Private limited, KK Jain Trust, Bloom Relators and Hospitality, Vidya Shakti Cement Private limited, Axis Institute of learning Private limited, Thathagat Siksha Samiti, Bhagwat PD Educational and Welfare Trust, Shyam Ganga Builders Private limited, etc. Besides, the names of Suman Gupta, Gaya Prasad Kushwaha, an MlC from Saharanpur, Babu Singh’s wife Shivkanya have also also included in the list which in under ED scanner.
last year, the ED had seized a Vibhuti Khand plot in Gomtinagar reportedly owned by Kushwaha. The ED also had seized properties - Shyam Ganga Builders Pvt Builders, Renuka In and Hotels, and Renuka Complex in Deoria.
Kushwaha’s assets on paper are shown to be worth Rs 60 crore. However the ED probe pointed that Kushwaha had invested huge money in 10 big industrial houses spread in Kolkata, Delhi, Noida, Ghaziabad etc. Kushwaha, had also entered into partnership with a former MlA and a MlC while investing in the said companies. Further investigations are on in the case.