A Delhi court today allowed the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to send 'Letter of Request' (LR) to six countries for collecting evidence in a money laundering case involving the Surya Vinayak Industries Ltd for allegedly cheating a consortium of banks to the tune of Rs 2,240 crore.
The application moved by special public prosecutor Nitesh Rana, appearing for the ED, said that the firm had diverted loan amount availed of from banks to abroad in the garb of investment.
"During the course of investigation, it was found that the firm created seven wholly owned subsidiaries abroad in six countries and in the garb of investment diverted bank loan amount availed from the banks," Rana told the court.
The application submitted that the UAE, Indonesia, Hong Kong and Singapore were members of Financial Action Task Force (FATF), of which, India is also a members.
Letters of Request are a formal request from a court to a foreign court for judicial assistance.
Rana also pointed out that India and the above mentioned countries are also signatories to the United Nations Convention against Transactional Organisation Crime.
"By virtue of their international commitments, the member countries are required to provide widest possible range of mutual legal assistance in relation to money laundering probe, prosecutions and related proceedings.
If convicted, the accused may get a maximum 10 years of rigorous imprisonments.
The agency had last month filed a charge sheet against 36 accused, including the firm's two directors -- Sanjay Jain, Rajiv Jain -- and Sant Lal Agrawal, who owns hotel Radisson Blu, Dwarka.
Jains were arrested by the probe agency in the matter on August 22 last year and are currently on bail.
The case was registered by the CBI on a complaint of the Punjab National Bank (PNB) alleging that these accused, along with others, were using over 100 shell companies for routing and diverting bank funds.
The firm and the shell companies had no genuine business transactions, the agency alleged.
The company had allegedly diverted bank funds to the tune of Rs 2,240 crore, which resulted in loss to the consortium of banks. Over Rs 300 crore of working capital was also allegedly moved to six companies set abroad, the agency said.
It had alleged that the accused cheated 17 nationalised and four private banks. Later, the ED also registered a case in this regard.
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