ED raid in Kolkata: The Kolkata businessman, who was named accused during the Rs 17-crore cash recovery by Enforcement Directorate on Saturday, has been untraceable.
The Enforcement Directorate carried out the search operations under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002 on Saturday across six locations in Kolkata. The probe was in connection to an investigation relating to a fraud mobile gaming app.
The case was recorded on the basis of an FIR filed on February 15, 2021, under sections 420, 406, 409, 468, 469, 471, 34 of IPC by Park Street Police Station. The complaint was filed by Kolkata Police against the app developer Aamir Khan and a few others based on a complaint filed by Federal Bank authorities in the court of Ld. Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, Calcutta.
A photograph released by the federal agency showed multiple bundles of Rs 500 currency notes along with a few in the denomination of Rs 2,000, Rs 200 and Rs 100 stacked on a bed depicting the ED abbreviation.
Official sources said the cash was recovered from a premise which has an address mentioned as 'F 7.N A Khan' and is located in the Garden Reach area of Kolkata.
The ED was looking for the alleged prime accused in the case identified as Aamir Khan as he was not found at the premises that were raided.
Agency officials pressed in five note-counting machines and brought bank staff to ascertain the exact value of the cash haul.
A truck also brought in large steel trunks to the site by the evening so that the seized cash could be taken for depositing in a bank branch.
The ED said in a statement that its searches were conducted at half-a-dozen locations linked to the gaming app named 'E-Nuggets' and its promoter Aamir Khan and others.
CRPF personnel escorted the ED teams at locations like Garden Reach, Park Street and Mominpur areas in and around the West Bengal capital, among others. A total of Rs 17.32 crore in cash has been found from the said premises, official sources said.
The agency statement issued around 2:30 PM had said: "more than Rs 7 crore was found at the premises and counting of the amount was under progress."
In August, the ED had seized cash worth about Rs 50 crore along with jewellery and gold after it raided premises linked to Arpita Mukherjee, an alleged aide of former West Bengal minister Partha Chatterjee. Both were arrested by the agency.
Also Read: Kolkata: ED raids six places, seizes over Rs 17.3 crore cash in mobile app fraud case
