CA held for laundering suspended IAS officer's money

New Delhi, April 13 : The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday arrested a Chartered Accountant for his role in laundering of illegal money belonging to suspended Chhattisgarh official B.L. Agrawal, an official said.

The Chartered Accountant, Sunil Agrawal, was arrested on charges of Money Laundering Act from his home town in Chhattisgarh's Raipur. 

The 46-year-old accountant was mainly looking after Income Tax-related work, preparation and filing of Income Tax returns of its clientele and providing services mainly to Raipur-based Prime Ispat Ltd, its directors and others, the ED official said. 

Agrawal, whose Rs 36 crore property was attached by the ED earlier this month, is one of the directors of the Prime Ispal Ltd. 

The ED official said the chartered accountant was the key person who helped the suspended IAS officer in laundering inappropriate money received by him through various bank accounts opened by him, depositing cash in those accounts, opening of shell companies, transfer of money from accounts to shell companies and investment by shell companies in Prime Ispat Ltd.

"In order to launder tainted assets, 446 bank accounts were opened in the names of various persons belonging to the villages of Kharora, Motimpurkala, Chingaria and Mandheipur in the Union Bank of India's Ramsagarpara and Pandri Branches in Raipur district," the ED official said.

B.L. Agrawal illegally formed 13 shell companies for facilitating transfer of money from various sources to Prime Ispat Ltd and the family members of the chartered accountant were made the directors in these companies, the official said. 

"These shell companies were controlled and operated by Sunil Agrawal from his office address. The cash deposits made in the benami accounts were immediately transferred to the 13 shell companies as share application money. 

"The investigation reveals that these 13 shell companies were formed for the objective of laundering the illegal cash money belonging B.L. Agrawal. A total of Rs 36.09 crore was invested as share capital money in Prime Ispat Ltd through these 13 shell companies," the official added