ED QUIZZES NCP’S PATEL AS PART OF PROBE IN MONEY LAUNDERING CASE
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday questioned Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Praful Patel in connection with a money laundering investigation related to the assets of the late Iqbal Mirchi, a close aide to underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.
Patel reached ED’s Ballard Estate office on Friday morning at 10.30 am for the questioning on whether he had met anyone from the Mirchi family and had any financial transactions with them. According to ED officials who requested anonymity, the questioning was over property deals Patel may have had with the Mirchi family.
According to ED officials, Patel’s Millennium Developers Pvt Ltd constructed a building called Ceejay House in Mumbai in 2006-07 and its third and fourth floors, measuring around 14,000 square feet, were transferred to Mirchi’s wife Hajra Iqbal Memon. The land on which the building stands , the agency suspects, was owned by Mirchi and purchased from the proceeds of crime of money laundering, drug trafficking and extortion.
Patel clarified at a press conference in Mumbai earlier this week that there was no financial transaction or partnership between Hajra and his family, as claimed by the agency. Michi’s family too has been summoned in connection with the case. The family sent an email to ED stating that Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) provisions were not applicable outside the country. Hajra and her son Junaid are believed to be in the UAE and another son, Asif, in London, ED officials said.