The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Tuesday arrested five senior executives of Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi’s companies in the Rs 11,400 crore Punjab National Bank (PNB) scam.

The arrests of Finance, Firestar International/diamonds group president Vipul Ambani, authorised signatory of three accused firms Kavita Mankikar, Firestar Group senior executive Arjun Patil, Nakshatra Group CFO Kapil Khandelwal and Gitanjali Gems manager Niten Shahi came after the CBI questioning 10 PNB officials, including an Executive Director, and 18 employees of Nirav Modi and Gitanjali Group of firms on Tuesday.

The CBI also questioned CFO of Firestar International Ravi Gupta, president (Foreign Finance Division) Saurabh Sharma and finance executive Subhash Parab.

The Income Tax Department slapped fresh charges under the new anti-black money law against jeweller Nirav, for allegedly holding an illegal asset abroad. This is the second overseas asset that the taxman suspects has not been disclosed to it by Nirav. The I-T department had last week slapped Sections of the Black Money (Undisclosed Foreign Income and Assets) and Imposition of Tax Act, 2015 against Nirav after it detected that a bank account in Singapore was allegedly held by him.

Meanwhile, the law enforcement agencies — CBI, Enforcement Directorate (ED), and I-T Department — on Tuesday continued with their raids on properties linked to Nirav and Mehul’s Gitanjali Jewels across the country.

The ED investigation has revealed that that more than 120 fraud shell companies were created by both the accused, out of which 80 and 40 were created by Nirav and Mehul, respectively. The agency suspects that Nirav and Mehul used these shell companies to launder money.

On the other hand, the CBI on Tuesday recorded statements of senior PNB officials. The CBI sources said the agency has questioned 28 people, including eight employees of Nirav in Mumbai while the IT Department has raided 20 premises linked to Gitanjali Gems promoter Mehul and associated firms in connection with a tax evasion case. A CBI team also carried out raids at palatial bungalow at Farm House at Alibaug, a coastal town in the Konkan region which is 100 km from Mumbai. Both the ED and the CBI are coordinating on a daily basis for the future course of action in this case.

“We have recovered substantial documents from the raids we carried out at three places, primarily at the houses of three accused arrested on Monday,” said CBI spokesperson Abhishek Dayal.

Meanwhile, three PNB officials-Bechhu Tiwari, Chief Manager, in charge of Forex department; Yashwant Joshi, manager in Forex department and Praful Sawant, officer export who have been arrested in the case, were remanded in police custody till March 3 by Mumbai court.

On Monday, Nirav wrote a letter to the PNB, saying he owes about Rs5,000 crore ($775 million). . He said the Rs11,400 crore cited by the bank had resulted in a media frenzy that pressured authorities to quickly search and seize assets from his Firestar International and Firestar Diamond International companies. “This thereby jeopardised our ability to discharge the dues of the group to the banks,” he said.