ED arrests 2 M2M promoters in money laundering case

CHANDIGARH: The enforcement directorate (ED) has arrested two promoters of Gurgaon-based realty group M2M in a money laundering case, officials said on Thursday. Basant Kumar Bansal and Pankaj Bansal were produced before additional district and sessions judge, Parveen Kumar Lal, in Panchkula, who sent them to five-day ED remand.
With their arrest, the tally of M2M promoters in ED net has reached three.The present case pertains to a Haryana anti-corruption bureau (ACB) FIR registered in April against former CBI judge Sudhir Parmar, his nephew and third M3M group director Roop Kumar Bansal.
The judge, according to the ACB FIR, was alleged to have been showing favouritism in the ED and CBI cases against the M3M group directors and another real estate group — IREO.
The judge was later suspended by the Punjab and Haryana high court. He has already joined the investigations. The ED had on June 1 swooped down on the premises of M3M promoters and others in another money laundering case linked to the IREO group and its promoter Lalit Goyal. Subsequently, the agency arrested Roop Kumar on June 9, while Basant and Pankaj obtained interim protection from arrest till July 5 from the Delhi high court in this case. Roop Kumar’s name had also cropped up in the case registered by ACB into “cash for undue favours” by former CBI judge.
However, the ED has now arrested them in the ACB-case linked money laundering case. The agency had issued a statement after the June 1 raids and alleged that “huge amount of money running into hundreds of crores was siphoned off through the M3M group” in the case against the IREO group.
In one of the transactions, M3M group received about Rs 400 crore from the IREO Group through several shell companies in multiple layers, it had alleged.
As per officials aware of the details, while producing Basant and Pankaj, ED sleuths informed the court that their custodial interrogation was required as the details of the money trail, transaction proofs and routing had to be ascertained.