NEW DELHI: The Enforcement Directorate has arrested Ashish Bhalla, the promoter of the Delhi-NCR-based realty group WTC, in a money laundering case linked to homebuyers’ funds, official sources said on Friday. Bhalla was taken into custody under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) on Thursday and a special court in Gurugram sent him to ED custody for six days, they said.
The agency alleged that after promising assured returns in exchange for investment against plots or commercial spaces, WTC “diverted” the funds of depositors and these were “siphoned off” to several shell companies to acquire lands at various locations.
Hundreds of crores of rupees were also diverted to suspicious entities in Singapore whose beneficial ownership is with Bhalla’s family members, the agency alleged.
During the probe, it was found that the WTC group collected more than Rs 3,000 crore from various investors across several states, such as Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Chandigarh, Ahmedabad and Punjab.
The ED action comes after the agency raided multiple premises of the WTC Group and Bhalla apart from that of the Bhutani Group and its promoter Ashish Bhutani on February 27.
It was alleged that Bhalla remained “absconding” during the raids and “induced” key persons against cooperating with the investigation.
He is a “key beneficiary” and the “mastermind” of the fraudulent activities of the group and has made unlawful gains through the scheme, according to the ED.
The ED case stems from dozens of FIRs filed by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Delhi Police and Faridabad police against the WTC group and its promoters including Ashish Bhalla, Suparna Bhalla, Abhijeet Bhalla, Bhutani Infra and others for cheating, criminal breach of trust and fraud against hundreds of homebuyers by the accused companies and persons, the ED said in an earlier statement.
These police cases were booked on the basis of complaints from “hundreds” of homebuyers and investors.
Bhutani Infra said in a statement last week that it severed all ties with the WTC Group earlier this month and “is now fully cooperating with the ED in its investigation”. There was no comment from the WTC group.
The ED said the police FIRs alleged that WTC Faridabad Infrastructure Private Limited and its promoters “lured” the general public to invest in their project in Sector 111-114 for the allotment of residential plots.
The promoters and directors hatched a “criminal conspiracy” and “siphoned off” the hard-earned money of the plot buyers by not completing the project within the stipulated time and “non-delivery” of the plots to the buyers for more than 10 years, it said.
The FIRs also alleged that the Bhutani Infra group acquired WTC and re-launched the project in Sector 111-114, Faridabad, keeping the plot buyers in “disarray”, committing fraud with investors and luring them to “surrender” their units, the ED said.
During the searches, the agency said, documents related to fund collection of more than Rs 3,500 crore from various investors against 15 projects were found in Delhi-NCR. The ED did not say where these documents were recovered from.
The agency had said it seized several “incriminating” documents related to diversion, layering of funds apart from property documents like sale and registration deeds and laptops and hard drives etc.
“Additionally, assets to the tune of thousands of crore (of rupees) have been identified in the name of WTC group,” it said.
Fixed deposits of WTC group of companies have also been frozen and seized along with jewellery and bullion worth Rs 1.5 crore, according to the ED.
