Ratul Puri's ED custody extended by 4 days in bank fraud case

A Delhi court on Friday extended by four days the custodial interrogation of Ratul Puri, nephew of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath, by the Enforcement Directorate in a bank loan fraud related money laundering case.

Special judge Sanjay Garg passed the order on the ED's plea seeking four more days' of Puri's custody, after the advocate appearing for the accused did not oppose the request.

"With a view to enable the investigating agency to unearth the entire conspiracy, find out the trail of proceeds of crime, establish the identity of other unknown co-accused persons and confront the accused with voluminous record of documents, the custody remand of accused is extended for four days," the court said.

While seeking his further custody, the ED told the court that "during probe, voluminous record of documents has been collected and due to paucity of time, the could not be confronted with them".

The agency said that the extension of custody was required for four days for "thorough interrogation to unearth the entire conspiracy, find out the trail of he proceeds of crime and investment of other unknown accused persons and confront the accused with the voluminous record of documents".

Advocate Vijay Aggarwal, appearing for the accused, said that though the accused was not admitting the contents of the ED's application, "he does not oppose the grant of remand in his endeavour to fully co-operate with investigating agency".

ED had arrested Puri on August 20 in the money laundering case arising out of the bank loan fraud case.

The court had on August 26 extended Puri's ED custody by four days.

There is another money laundering case connected with the AgustaWestland VVIP chopper scam in which the Delhi High Court had earlier dismissed his anticipatory bail plea, saying his custodial interrogation was "required for an effective investigation".

Puri was arrested under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in the bank fraud case after he appeared before the central probe agency here in the chopper scam after it had slapped a fresh criminal case against him and others, taking cognisance of a CBI FIR.

The latest PMLA case emerged from a CBI FIR of August 17, where Ratul Puri, his father Deepak Puri, mother Nita (Nath's sister) and others were booked in connection with a Rs 354 crore bank fraud case filed by the Central Bank of India.

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The CBI had carried out multiple searches in pursuance of this FIR.

The Puri family, other individuals like Sanjay Jain and Vineet Sharma were booked by the CBI for alleged criminal conspiracy, cheating, forgery and corruption.

Ratul Puri was booked in this case in his capacity as executive director of Moser Baer India Limited (MBIL), a firm promoted by his father Deepak Puri.

The company is manufactured optical storage media like compact discs, DVDs, solid state storage devices.

Ratul Puri had resigned from the post of executive director in 2012, while his parents continue to be on the board, the bank had said in a statement and compliant to the CBI.

Moser Baer was taking loans from various banks since 2009 and went for debt restructuring a number of times, the bank had alleged in the complaint which is now part of the CBI FIR.

When it was unable to pay the debt, a forensic audit was done and the the account was declared as "fraud" by the Central Bank of India on April 20, 2019, it had alleged.

The bank had claimed that the company and its directors forged and fabricated documents to induce the Central Bank of India to release funds.

Ratul Puri is facing criminal investigation by three main central probe agencies, ED, CBI and the Income Tax department.

The tax department has attached a number of his alleged 'benami' assets in the recent past and has charged him with benefiting from the purported kickbacks generated in the Rs 3,600 crore VVIP choppers deal case, cancelled by India in 2014 on charges of corruption. 

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