GG News Bureau
Raipur, 13th Jan. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) conducted raids on multiple premises in Chhattisgarh on Friday, including that of an IAS officer, as part of its ongoing money laundering investigation into an alleged coal levy scam in the state, officials said.
The searches are being conducted in Raipur, the state capital, Korba, Durg, and Ranchi in Jharkhand, and Bengaluru (Karnataka). Armed personnel of the Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) provide security for the ED teams
Premises associated with Anbalagan P-secretary of water resources, tourism, and culture- were also covered.
The 2004 batch Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer previously served in the incumbent Congress government as the secretary of mineral resources.
Alarmelmangai D, his wife, is an IAS officer (2004 batch) who works as the secretary of the urban administration and development department and the finance department. She previously worked as the Director of Geology and Mining in the Bhupesh Baghel government.
According to officials, some politicians, their affiliated businesses, and coal traders are also being raided.
The federal investigation agency launched an investigation into this case in October of last year after raiding the residences of another state IAS officer, Sameer Vishnoi, and some businessmen.
The investigation is into “a massive scam in which an illegal levy of Rs 25 was extorted for every tonne of coal transported in Chhattisgarh by a cartel involving senior bureaucrats, businessmen, politicians, and middlemen,” according to the agency.
Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel’s deputy secretary Saumya Chaurasia, Vishnoi, coal trader and alleged “main kingpin of the scam” Suryakant Tiwari, his uncle Laxmikant Tiwari and another coal businessman Sunil Agrawal have been arrested in this case till now.
Following the attachment of their properties worth more than Rs 150 crore in December, the ED claimed in a statement that Chaurasia, Vishnoi, and some coal traders allegedly linked to them “used” their relatives to create “benami” assets.
The agency claimed that in the natural resources-rich state, a “grand conspiracy” was hatched to perpetrate a coal levy “scam” in which Rs 540 crore was “extorted” over the last two years.
The money laundering case stems from an Income Tax department complaint filed following taxman raids in June 2022.
Suryakant Tiwari was identified by the agency as the “main henchman” at the ground level, who allegedly deployed his employees in various regions to extort money from coal transporters and industrialists, and his team was physically coordinating with lower level government functionaries, coal transporters, and user company representatives.
“Since his employees were spread across the state, they maintained WhatsApp groups, excel sheets of each coal delivery order and the extorted amounts and shared them with Suryakant Tiwari, who in turn maintained detailed handwritten diaries of the incoming bribe amounts and their utilisation for purchase of benami lands, payment of bribes, payments for political expenditure etc,” the agency alleged.
“This kind of systemic extortion was not possible without the knowledge and active participation of the state machinery,” it said.
The fact that it (alleged extortion racket) ran uninterrupted without a single FIR and collected around Rs 500 crore in two years, clearly indicates that all the accused persons were acting in a concerted manner at the instructions of person(s) at the highest level, having command and control over the state machinery, the ED said.
Comments are closed.