The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday raided facilities, including that of the Popular Front of India (PFI) chairman OM Abdul Salam, in Kerala’s Thiruvananthapuram and Kochi in connection with a money laundering investigation, officials familiar with said. The issue.
Raids are taking place at 26 locations in nine states: Kerala, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, Karnataka, Delhi and Maharashtra.
The PFI is under investigation for alleged financial ties to protesters against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act (CAA) earlier this year. The ED in January of this year presented a note to the Union Ministry of the Interior saying that “there is a direct correlation between the dates of the deposits / withdrawals of money from PFI bank accounts and those of the demonstrations against the CAA.”
“It has been observed that Rs 1.04 million were deposited into 15 bank accounts of PFI (10) and Rehab India Foundation (5) during the period from 04.12.2019 to 06.01.2020. Deposits were made in the form of cash and IMPS using mobile devices and deposit amounts range from Rs 5,000 to Rs 49,000. The amounts have been kept below 50,000 rupees in order to [not] reveal the identity of the depositor, ”the note said.
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“Rs1.34 crore was withdrawn from these 15 accounts from December 4, 2019 to January 6, 2020 in cash and NEFT / IMPS using mobile devices.” Withdrawals were made in small amounts of Rs2,000 to Rs5,000 on multiple occasions.
The note, a copy of which HT has seen, said that 80 to 90 withdrawals from a single account were made on December 12 and 21 when protests took place in various locations in Uttar Pradesh.
“The money trail has proven beyond a doubt that PFI has mobilized the money to fund the cost of the demonstration / gherao against the CAA bill until 06/01/2020. The investigation continues to trace the money trail from other bank accounts, ”the note says.
PFI, which has denied all allegations against him, did not immediately respond to ED’s raids.
The organization has been accused of forced conversions, radicalization of Muslim youth and links to prohibited clothing.
The National Investigation Agency (NIA) called it a threat to national security and then-Union Minister Kiren Rijiju said in January 2018 that the government was considering banning the equipment. The government has yet to ban PFIs.
Prior to ED’s investigation, the NIA named PFI in at least four cases. They include the one involving cutting off the palm of a teacher’s hand in Kerala’s Idukki district in July 2010, the assassination of a Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh leader in Bangalore in October 2016, the so-called Islamic State module Omar Al- Hindi in Kochi and a training camp in Kannur, where bombs, improvised explosive devices and swords were recovered in April 2013.
In 2016, NIA said that PFI’s Sathya Sarini was involved in several conversions in Kerala. The agency never charged PFI.
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