Govt agency still hunting for Nirav in India, says seized diamond worth Rs 200 cr more

MUMBAI: The investigating agencies believe that Nirav Modi fled from the country few days ago, but they received calls from a number of reliable informants stating that he is still in the country. One of the informants even provided a location where Nirav Modi is probably hiding. The governing agencies are hunting for Nirav, his wife, brother and uncle for defrauding Punjab National Bank. In another development, Enforcement Directorate officials said that they suspect involvement of more PNB bank officials in the fraud.

The CBI and ED has booked Nirav Modi, his wife Ami, brother Nishal and uncle Mehul Choksi, in cheating and money laundering cases. They also booked Gokulnath Setty, deputy manager at PNB (retired) along with a clerk Manjor Kharat in the case. Officials are trying to trace Modi and his relatives for questioning in the case. All of them went underground, said officials. There is no clarity if they have fled abroad or are still hiding at some undisclosed location in India.

An official stated that they received information about a location, where Nirav was probably hiding in India. They even sent a team but didn't find the designer there. Officials stated that during examination of Nirav's showrooms, they came across new addresses. While conducting search at one of the new premises in Mumbai, officials recovered diamonds and gold jewellery worth Rs 200 crore more from a diamond polishing unit. On Thursday, the ED has seized jewellery worth Rs 5,100 crore from different premises belonged to Nirav at Mumbai, Delhi, Surat, Jaipur and Hyderabad.

Officials decided to shift the ornament to government vault and will ask experts to ascertain its value. The ED concluded the worth of the jewellery through their import stock receipt and market value of the jewellery could be more than Rs 5,300 crore.

Meanwhile, the ED started to call senior officials of PNB for questioning to examine their role in the Rs 11,300 crore fraud case. ED officials said that the PNB official story related with the fraud "unbelievable" and suspect role of many other officials in the case. In the complaint, the bank had put entire blame on Shetty and Kharat after stating that other bank officials were unaware about the fraud.

An ED officer said, "It not possible for the two bank officials (Shetty and Kharat) to commit this crime alone. We suspect other bank officials involvement in the criminal conspiracy. Soon we will call senior bank officials for questioning and will inquire each of their role in the case."