5 diamond traders arrested, deny charges
MUMBAI: More than two years after a first information report (FIR) was filed against them, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested five diamond traders for purportedly sending fake foreign remittances worth ₹1,600 crore through various nationalised banks, using forged documents on diamond imports.
Anil Chokhara, Sunil Chokhara, Rajiv Chhagla, Harakhchand Shah and Nikhilesh Kakkad were produced before a special CBI magistrate on Tuesday and were remanded to CBI custody for a week.cbi’s prosecutor, RR Yadav, said the accused had opened accounts with various nationalised banks which were used to siphon valuable foreign currency to Hong Kong and Dubai using forged documents.
According to the CBI, illegal foreign remittances were made using forged bills of entry and fabricated pro forma invoices showing import of rough and polished diamonds. A remittance is the fund an expatriate sends to their country of origin via wire, mail, or online transfer. “Multiple duplicates of these Bills of Entry were submitted to different banks to falsely show imports, and to remit huge sums of foreign exchange outside India,” the CBI stated. Yadav said the gang executed a systematic fraud worth ₹1,593 crore, but the CBI suspects the total amount to be around ₹10,000 crore. Special CBI magistrate GG Bhansali sent all the accused to CBI custody for a week observing “obviously all this cannot be done by a single person.” The accused’s lawyers opposed CBI’S demand claiming the case was also being probed by Enforcement Directorate (ED) and Customs. Pankaj Jha, the lawyer representing Sunil Chokhara, said Anil – Sunil’s brother – brought the entire scam to the notice of agencies. Chhagla’s lawyer, Irfan Shaikh, said the claim about Chhagla being the director of the companies was false. Shah was represented by Sujit Shelar who argued he had nothing to with the fraud. He submitted that ED had made Shah a witness in the money laundering case. Kakkad’s lawyer also argued that he was being falsely implicated.
Multiple duplicates of Bills of Entry were submitted to different banks to remit huge sums of foreign exchange outside India. RR YADAV, CBI prosecutor