India / Anil Deshmukh skips ED summons for 4th time, says probe not fair

Mumbai: Former Maharashtra home minister Anil Deshmukh has skipped the fourth summons issued to him by the Enforcement Directorate (ED). Instead,the Nationalist Congress Party leader sent a letter to ED investigators on Monday, claiming the agency’s probe was “neither fair nor impartial”.

ED had sent Deshmukh fourth summon last week, asking him to remain present before its officers on Monday for questioning in the money laundering case linked to the alleged bribery-cum-extortion racket run by him through (now dismissed) controversial cop Sachin Vaze.

The NCP leader sent his legal representative to the agency’s office to hand over his letter. In his letter to ED, Deshmukh claimed that the fourth summons to him despite his matter being pending before the Supreme Court indicated that the investigation was not fair and impartial.

The former minister said that the Supreme Court on July 30 adjourned hearing on his plea regarding protection from any coercive action in the money laundering case to August 3. And despite this, the ED issued fresh summons to him on the same day, asking him to appear before the agency just a day before the next hearing.

In the writ petition scheduled to come up before the apex court on Tuesday, August 3, Deshmukh has urged that the very ED investigations are not only actuated with malice both in law as well as fact, but also the same stand vitiated on account of grave violation of the procedure established by law.

He stated, “lt appears that the summons have been issued solely with an aim to create a prejudice so as to either serve the media or sensationalise the matter before the (Supreme) Court by alleging purported non-compliance thereof by me.”

“I shall abide by the orders of the courts of law and would submit myself to any appropriate direction or order that may be passed by the courts in due course of law. I am more than eager to associate with the purported enquiry/investigations being carried out by your office so as to lay bare the hollowness, falsity and lack of substance therein,” his statement reads.

Deshmukh did not appear for the earlier three summons and sent his lawyer instead. His son Hrishikesh too didn’t appear before the agency on Monday despite three summons.

The money laundering case against Deshmukh was registered by ED after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed a first information report (FIR) against him on April 21. Deshmukh said the allegations against him are false.

The central agency has alleged that while serving as the Maharashtra home minister, Deshmukh misused his position, and through assistant police inspector Sachin Vaze – who has now been dismissed and is in Taloja jail for his alleged role in the Antilia explosives scare and Mansukh Hiran murder cases – collected ₹4.7 crore from Mumbai’s bars for their “smooth functioning”.

Later, through hawala channels, this money was sent to two brothers in Delhi who operated bogus companies, said the agency. It claimed that at Hrishikesh’s behest, the two brothers diverted the money as donations to Nagpur-based Shri Sai Shikshan Sansthan, an educational trust controlled by the Deshmukhs.

ED has also claimed that while collecting money from the bar owners, Vaze told them that a part of the amount was to go to an entity – ‘No 1’ – as well as the crime and social service branches of Mumbai Police.

The anti-money laundering agency has also said that Vaze’s in his statement to ED said that he was called to Deshmukh’s official residence and directed to collect ₹3 lakh from every bar and restaurant in the city. He was also given a list of the establishments.

During investigation, ED has identified 24 private entities that are controlled by the Deshmukh family and found that huge sums of money had been transacted among them without any rationale.

The agency then arrested Deshmukh’s personal secretary Sanjeev Palande and assistant Kundan Shinde on June 26, claiming that they had handled the money laundering linked to extortion for Deshmukh.

In mid-July, the anti-money laundering agency provisionally attached Deshmukh’s properties, worth ₹4.2 crore. The attached assets include a residential flat in Worli valued at ₹1.54 crore and 25 land parcels of book value ₹2.67 crore at Dhutum village at Uran in the neighbouring Raigad district.

ED said its investigation has revealed that the Worli flat was purchased by the NCP leader in 2004 by making cash payment entirely by cash. It was registered in the name of Deshmukh’s wife Aarti, but the sale deed for the flat was registered in February 2020 after he became the home minister. The other seized properties too are held in Aarti’s name as well as in the name of company, Premier Port Links Pvt Ltd.

Deshmukh said the allegations against him, made by former Mumbai Police chief Param Bir Singh, cropped up only after the cop was shunted out over his poor handling of the Antilia and the Hiran murder cases.