Lawyer Tandon held in money laundering case
600m rupees of black money alleged to be converted
new delhi — The Enforcement Directorate on Thursday arrested a Delhi-based lawyer for allegedly converting demonetised currency worth Rs600 million into new notes in connivance with a bank manager at Kotak Mahindra Bank.
“Advocate Rohit Tandon has been arrested under PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) in over Rs600 million note conversion case in connivance with Kotak Mahindra Bank manager Ashish Kumar and hawala trader Paras Mal Lodha,” an ED official said.
Tandon was arrested here after being grilled by the ED officials for almost a week.
The ED officials arrested Ashish Kumar on Wednesday and Lodha was held on December 21.
The ED sources said that Tandon had given Rs10.5 million as commission to Kumar, the bank manager at Kotak Mahindra Bank’s Connaught Place branch, for converting his demonetised high-value currency into new currency.
While questioning Tandon, the ED officials also learnt that he took the help of Lodha, 62, a businessman with interests in real estate and mining, who was intercepted at the Mumbai airport while he was trying to flee to Malaysia, to convert his high-value demonetised notes worth over Rs20.6 million into new currency.
Cash amounting to Rs130.65 million, including Rs20.6 million in new currency notes, was seized from Tandon’s office on December 10. —