Assets worth more than Rs 121 crore of Anwar Dhebar, who is the elder brother of Raipur Mayor Aijaz Dhebar, IAS officer Anil Tuteja, former MD of Chhattisgarh State Marketing Corporation Ltd. Arun Pati Tripathi and others have been attached in the alleged liquor scam-linked money laundering case, the ED said Monday.
The properties, provisionally attached under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), include 69 belonging to Anwar Dhebar worth Rs 98.78 crore, 14 properties of Tuteja worth Rs 8.83 crore and one asset of Tripathi, an Indian Telecom Service (ITS) officer, worth Rs 1.35 crore, the federal agency said in a statement.
Tuteja is a 2003-batch IAS officer and is currently posted as the joint secretary in the state’s industry and commerce department.
Hotel Vennington Court in Chhattisgarh capital Raipur of Anwar Dhebar, being run under the aegis of his firm A Dhebar Buildcon, has also been attached, the Enforcement Directorate said.
Properties of Vikash Agarwal alias Subbu worth Rs 1.54 crore and 32 properties of Arvind Singh worth Rs 11.35 crore have also been attached as part of the same order. The total value of all attached properties is Rs 121.87 crore.
This money laundering case stems from a 2022 Income Tax department charge sheet filed against IAS officer Tuteja and others before a court in Delhi.
Anwar Dhebar, Tripathi and two others have been arrested by the ED in this case till now.
The ED had alleged that money was “illegally” collected for “every” bottle of liquor sold in Chhattisgarh and evidence of “unprecedented” corruption and money laundering of Rs 2,000 crore generated by an alcohol syndicate led by Anwar Dhebar had been unearthed.
It had conducted “more than 50 search operations” at various locations in Raipur and Bhilai in Chhattisgarh apart from Delhi, Kolkata and Mumbai and the ED had earlier said it seized movable assets worth Rs 58 crore including cash, fixed deposits, shares and jewellery.
Thus, the total seizure and attachment in the case now stand at about Rs 180 crore, it said.
The ED has said that “corruption” was done in four ways as part of this alleged illegal liquor syndicate.
Part-A pertains to “commission” where the agency alleged that a bribe was collected from the distillers per case of liquor procured from them by the CSMCL.
Part B pertains to the sale of “unaccounted” ‘kacha’ or country liquor. Not even a single rupee reached the state exchequer and all the sale proceeds were pocketed by the syndicate and that “illegal” liquor was sold from state-run shops only, the ED has alleged.
Under Part-C of the alleged scam, the “bribes” were taken from distillers to allow them to make a cartel and have a fixed market share, the agency has alleged.
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