In a major criminal action against chit fund companies, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday attached 2,631 bank accounts of the Rose Valley Group with deposits worth `295 crore under the stringent provisions of the anti-money laundering law.
The attachment order issued by the Kolkata Zonal office of the agency under Prevention of Money laundering Act (PMlA) has frozen these bank accounts, both in private and public sectors, in West Bengal, Odisha, Jharkhand, Tripura, Assam and Himachal Pradesh
A total of `295 crores held in these accounts have been sealed by the agency with immediate effect, official sources said.
The ED, according to the attachment order issued under Section 5 of PMlA, has found that the Rose Valley Group had floated as many as 27 companies for running the alleged chit fund operations out of which only half-a-dozen were active.
All the attachments made on Thursday by the agency related to two firms - Rose Valley Estate Construction limited and Rose Valley Hotel and Entertainment
Private limited.
The ED has found that the firm had allegedly floated the scheme by promising inflated returns on the investments between 8 and 27 per cent to gullible investors in various States.
The company had promised such astronomical returns to depositors by claiming appreciation from investments in properties and assets and bookings done in the real estate sector. The ED has pegged the total volume of the alleged irregularities by the Group at `15,000 crore.
The probe found that the company had made "cross investments" in its various sister firms to suppress its liabilities towards investors.
The agency, through its Special Director (East) Yogesh Gupta, had informed the Special Investigation Team (SIT) on black money about the alleged irregularities involving the company. The attachment order will now be sent to the Adjudicating Authority of PMlA in New Delhi for final approval and till then these accounts will remain sealed.
The agency filed a money laundering case against the firm earlier this year after going through multiple FIRs filed by various State police departments against the activities and chit fund schemes floated by the group.
This is one of the biggest attachment exercises by the ED under PMlA.