ED summons Amrapali officials

New Delhi: Stepping up investigations into money-laundering allegations against real-estate developer Amrapali Group following the recent Supreme Court order that had cancelled the group's RERA registration, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has summoned directors and officials of the company in connection with the case. The ED has issued summons to directors and several key officials of the real-estate group for questioning in connection with its probe under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, a highly placed source in the know told the Millennium Post.

The financial probe agency had registered a money-laundering case against Amrapali and its CMD Anil Kumar Sharma, earlier this month, on July 1, based on multiple FIRs registered by local law enforcement agencies.

Cases registered with the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police and Noida Police accused the group and its directors of duping buyers and investors of their hard-earned savings, by starting several high-value residential projects in and around Noida and Greater Noida and collecting buy-in amounts from buyers; while leaving the projects unfinished and not delivering the units to investors.

As per some of the EOW FIRs, complainants mentioned that the group had used a payment plan known as a subvention scheme, where buyers entered into a tripartite agreement with the developer and the bank in an arrangement where the lender bank paid EMI amounts until the project was finished.

However, complainants have alleged that in some case it seemed that bank officials might have been complicit in cheating homebuyers because Amrapali's projects kept getting bank approvals in spite of not having requisite permissions from Noida Authority.

According to the Apex court-appointed auditors, the group had collected money and diverted it to 40 of its group companies. The auditors had also found that homebuyers' money had been diverted for personal use of some of the directors.

The Supreme Court had,in its recent order, asked the ED to thoroughly probe allegations of money-laundering against Amrapali and examine the possible complicity of bank officials and public servants in the case.

A senior official said that the probe agency will soon question the directors and some key officials, who have been summoned in connection with the case.

The Delhi Police had approached the Supreme Court earlier this year, which had allowed not only custodial interrogation of Amrapali directors but gave the green light for their arrest as well. Subsequently, the EOW had arrested Sharma and directors Shiv Priya and Ajay Kumar in the case.