The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday raided the premises linked to former Cabinet minister and Congress leader Harak Singh Rawat, said the sources.
The searches were carried out at multiple premises in Uttarakhand, Delhi and Chandigarh, they said.
Apart from Harak Rawat, several other persons were also raided in a massive crackdown at more than 10 locations.
According to the source, ED's big action is linked to the alleged forest land scam under PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act). The ED investigation is understood to be linked to alleged illegal activities in the state's Corbett Tiger Reserve.
In August last year, the Vigilance Department had also taken action against Rawat.
Rawat had quit the BJP ahead of the 2022 Uttarakhand Assembly elections and joined the Congress.
ED raids AAP leaders
The development comes a day after the ED carried out raids at several locations of leaders from another opposition party - AAP. 23 ED officers carried out raids at AAP national convenor and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's personal assistant's residence. Kejriwal said the officials raided his PA's residence for 16 hours but did not find anything. He also claimed that the houses of AAP leaders such as Manish Sisodia, Satyendar Jain and Sanjay Singh were raided as well. But even there, the ED did not find anything, the national convener of the party said.
The ED on Tuesday searched the premises of Kejriwal's personal assistant (PA) Bibhav Kumar and others as part of its probe into charges that the AAP and some officials received kickbacks of about Rs 21 crore through alleged irregularities in a Delhi Jal Board (DJB) contract, official sources said.
The action is part of a money laundering investigation focusing on alleged bribes that were garnered through irregularities in the DJB tendering process and purportedly channelled as election funds to the AAP, they said.
A dozen premises in the national capital were searched by ED officials from 7 am under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The residences of Bibhav Kumar, former DJB member Shalabh Kumar, the office of party Rajya Sabha member and national treasurer N D Gupta, and the premises of chartered accountant Pankaj Mangal and others associated with the ruling party in Delhi were covered in the search action.
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