ED, IT to look into allegations of money laundering

CHANDIGARH: There is more trouble in store for the Sirsabased Dera Sacha Sauda as the Punjab and Haryana high court on Wednesday directed the Enforcement Directorate and the income tax department to conduct investigations into the allegations of money laundering in the functioning of the Dera Sacha Sauda.

The high court has asked the ED and I-T department to look into the dera funds and properties to see whether there was violation of the Income Tax Act and Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) before initiating the required action.

“The court has ordered the income tax department and the Enforcement Directorate to conduct a probe into allegations of money laundering against (dera chief) Gurmeet Ram Rahim Singh and his associates,” said Anupam Gupta, senior advocate Punjab and Haryana high court.

Gupta during the hearing told the court that Ram Rahim, convicted for raping of two female followers, was also involved in money-laundering

During the resumed hearing of a public interest litigation (PIL), the high court has asked retired sessions judge Anil KS Pawar, who was earlier appointed as a court commissioner to oversee the sanitisation process of Dera Sacha Sauda, said that nothing objectionable was found during the search of the dera heeadquarters and the old commune. He told the court that the search operation was nothing less than the postmortem. Pawar had sought some time for the compilation of the report.

The high court had asked ED and IT to scrutinized Pawar’s report that would be submitted to the centre and Haryana government to probe the angel of money laundering.

Referring to the damage to private and public properties in the riots following the conviction of Ram Rahim, the bench asked the Punjab and Haryana governments to set up tribunals.

The HC has asked Punjab and Haryana to set up tribunals to examine claims of damages received from petitioner. “The high court has ordered that these tribunals will examine the claims and quantify the amount payable,” said Gupta.

Two tribunals will also be constituted to look into damages in several parts of Punjab and Har- yana during violence following the dera chief’s conviction. The tribunals will verify the veracity of claims made by people whose properties were damaged.

On the basis of the report of these two tribunals, the high court will decide as to how much amount has to be paid to claimants.

During the hearing, advocate Navkiran Singh appraised the court that about 25 persons have gone missing from the Dera and 18 FIRs have been registered in this connection. The high court has asked for a status report on the investigations with regard to the missing persons.