Money laundering case: Bhosale's custody extended till Jul 11; ED says he illegally got Rs 431 cr

ABIL group chairman Avinash Bhosale in connivance with another realtor and co-accused Sanjay Chhabria illegally obtained Rs 431 crore in one of his beneficially owned entities, the Enforcement Directorate told a special court here on Tuesday while seeking further custody of Bhosale in a money laundering case.

The Central probe agency also told the court DHFL had illegally diverted funds to the tune of Rs 37.50 crore to Bhosale and his entities.

Special PMLA judge M G Deshpande extended the remand of Pune-based Bhosale till July11.

The contention of the ED in the previous remand was that Yes Bank disbursed Rs 3,983 crore to DHFL, which then diverted Rs 2317 crore to Radius Group of Sanjay Chhabria, who in turn gave Rs 267 crore to Nibodh Realty LLP of Bhosale.

On Tuesday, the ED, represented by special public prosecutor Hiten Venegaokar, sought extension of remand, saying further probe has revealed Bhosale's ABIL group has 84 entities, comprising 40 companies, 29 LLP firms, six partnership firms, four individuals, three proprietorship firms and 2 AOPs (Association of Persons).

It said the probe has further revealed that DHFL, which had received POC amounting to Rs 3,983 crore from Yes Bank during April 2018 to June 2018, had illegally diverted Rs 37.50 crore to Bhosale and his beneficially owned entities during the same period.

''This fund was given by DHFL to Bhosale and to his entities in the name of fee/consultancy charges etc. for providing services related to loans given to various projects by DHFL. However, investigation has revealed no such services were ever provided by Avinash Bhosle or his entities,'' the ED said.

Thus, the said payments made by DHFL were nothing but siphoning of funds, the probe agency told court.

Bhosale, represented by advocates Vijay and Rahul Aggarwal, opposed the ED's plea, saying reasons in the application for extension of remand were ''vague".

Everything was thoroughly investigated and the accused had cooperated, and, therefore, there was no need to further extend ED custody, Vijay Aggarwal argued.

Extending Bhosale's custody till July 11, the judge noted that investigation was necessary as the process of money laundering is complex and hard to bring on record.

There are so many links, for example generation of proceeds of crime, placement, layering and integration thereof, he said.

The CBI probe in the Yes Bank-DHFL bank fraud case had brought Pune-based auto driver-turned-real estate baron Avinash Bhosale under the scanner as the agency has alleged that he, as a middleman, received kickbacks of over Rs 360 crore from another real estate firm for facilitating loans from DHFL, which turned into non performing assets.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)