Dr.Thomas (Special Correspondent)
Directorate of Enforcement has provisionally attached immovable and movable assets worth Rs. 78.63 Crore,under Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA) including properties worth Rs. 37.58 Crore of a Hyderabad based firm SA Builders & Developers.
The ED also recovered bank account worth Rs. 41.05 crore from Syed Akhtar is Partner of SA builders through Bengaluru based Neelanchal Technocrats Pvt Ltd of Sallarpuria Group.
The ED had registered a money laundering case In 2018 against Mrs.Nowhera Sheik owner of Heera group of companies in Hyderabad and others who had collected more than Rs.5000 crore from public as investment against false promise of unreasonably high 36 per cent annual return on investment but failed to repay even the principal amounts and thus duped thousands of investors.
Investigation revealed that Mrs.Nowhera Sheik had transferred Rs.148 crore (approx.) to one M/s SA Builders and Developers for purchasing properties situated at Tolichowki,Hyderabad .
But properties only worth Rs.70 crore (approx.) were actually registered which were earlier attached in the hands of Heera Group.
The remaining funds of Rs.78 crore which were part of crime proceeds were found to be parked with the M/s SA Builders and Developers.
Further investigation by ED revealed that SA Builders and Developers had transferred Rs 41 crore out of above Rs 78 crore to Neelanchal Technocrats Pvt. Ltd,and 4 other Shell entities in Kolkata and Shillong and the funds were ultimately routed back to Sallarpuria Sattva group as loans.
ED had conducted search in November at the office of the Sallarpuria Sattva group in Bangalore and unearthed the above money trail and subsequently attached immovable properties and bank balances of Rs.78 crore as equivalent value of the crime proceeds.
Prior to this, ED has provisionally attached properties worth Rs.300 crore in the same case. Further investigation is in progress.
