New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday recovered Rs 3.9 crore more from the residential premises of sand mafia Bhupinder Singh Honey in the raids.
An amount of Rs 80 lakh has been recovered from one of the other places covered in search.
The ED raids are currently underway at nearly dozen places in Punjab in connection in with an alleged illegal sand mining case, an official told ANI.
Today is the second day of search, which started yesterday at around 7:30 am and a total amount of Rs 10.7 crore has been recovered so far.
The amount of cash found at the residential premises of Bhupinder Singh Honey at Ludhiana is now total Rs 7.9 crores (Rs 3.9 cr today and Rs 4 crore yesterday). Cash amounting to Rs 2 crore was recovered on Tuesday at Ludhiana.
The federal agency made the recovery during raids in poll-bound Punjab as part of a money-laundering probe against the 'sand mafia' and companies linked to alleged illegal sand mining in the border state.
The raids, which started around 7.30 am on Tuesday, were conducted at places including Chandigarh and Mohali and the action was undertaken under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), said ED officials.
Sand mafia Bhupinder Singh Honey, is a relative of Punjab Chief Minister Charanjit Singh Channi and had allegedly floated a firm named Punjab Realtors to get sand mining contracts.
Yesterday an ED official confirmed ANI that the raiding team of the ED recovered over Rs 6 crore during searches at Honey's residence Homeland Heights Society in Mohali's Sector-70 and other places. The ED has refused to connect any political links in the case.
The ED action is initiated after taking cognisance of a FIR registered Punjab Police in 2018 against more than 2 dozen names including Kudratdeep Singh, Bhupinder Singh Honey in illegal sand mining in the state.
Punjab Police had registered the case in 2018 regarding illegal sand mining and Section 420 was later added to the FIR. The ED took over the case to probe under PMLA. In the FIR relating to Kudratdeep Singh and Bhupinder Singh Honey, a team comprising of officials of Mining Department, Civil Administration and Police Department made a surprise check on 07.03.2018 on the basis of a complaint received at the Rohan Police Station, Saheed Bhagat Singh Nagar regarding illegal sand mining.
Consequently, it was found that several mines were being excavated by various machines and mining was being carried out beyond the designated area. Subsequently, the mining operation at Malikpur mining site was stopped and also the approval of weighment slips was stopped by the team.
As per the FIR, apart from Malikpur, illegal mining activities were also carried out at Burjtahl Das, Barsal, Lalewal, Mandala and Khosa which is under the investigation of agencies.
(Shailesh Yadav) (ANI)
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