The Enforcement Directorate arrested Anil Khandelwal, chief financial officer of global travel and travel company Cox and Kings Group (CKG) on Tuesday in connection with Yes Bank’s money laundering investigation, the agency said in a statement. In addition to Khandelwal, the agency also arrested Naresh Jain, the group’s internal auditor. The arrests have been made under article 19 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act of 2002 (PMLA).
Both defendants were presented before the Special Judge (PMLA) and were granted seven days of custody in the ED. The ED had claimed that the company defaulted on loan payments of Rs 3,642 million. During the seven days of custody, the ED officials intend to question the two regarding the wrongdoing and gather more evidence.
Earlier this year, the ED conducted raids on facilities owned by the top management of Cox and Kings Group (CKG) in connection with the money laundering investigation.
On March 8, the agency arrested the bank’s former president and managing director, Rana Kapoor. The travel company was sent to bankruptcy court last year in October after failing to make payments to the bank. The ED had been scanning its transactions to its borrowers.
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PMLA’s investigation into the Yes Bank case revealed that CKG forged its consolidated financial statements by manipulating the balance sheets of overseas subsidiaries. In addition, it was also found that some board resolutions presented to the banks to sanction the loans were falsified.
“Further investigation revealed that Yes Bank’s credit sanction was prompted by Kapoor and was granted in violation of the rules. The ED collected evidence regarding Kapoor’s direction from interested bank officials so that the loan would continue and they would not make efforts to recover it, ”the agency statement said.
According to the investigation, sales of Rs 3,908 crore were made to 15 non-existent / fictitious customers during the financial years (FY) 2015 to 2019. Most of the proceeds shown on the ledgers of Ezeego (another entity of the CKG group) was not found on the bank statements.
It was also found that fifteen high-value fictitious debtors reflected in the books of accounts. Another 147 customer groups also appeared suspicious and did not exist.
The group was found to have diverted 1.1 billion rupees to another company without board approval. It was also discovered that Khandelwal and Jain acquired the mortgaged property worth Rs 63 crore from their property business entity called M / s Reward Business Solutions without paying a penny out of pocket.
The agency stated that the duo had also purchased various real estate properties from the group’s siphoned funds.
“Research so far has revealed that Cox and King Group bank transactions do not match the books of accounts and Anil Khandelwal and Naresh Jain create disparities between the books of accounts and bank statements to camouflage fraud. Further investigations are ongoing, ”the press release added.
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