Bengaluru/New Delhi
In a major development, the Enforcement Directorate has arrested former State Minister and Congress leader B. Nagendra in connection with a money laundering probe related to the misappropriation of Rs 94.73 crore in the Karnataka Maharshi Valmiki Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation Limited.
The 52-year-old four-time MLA, who was arrested late on Friday night after 13 hours of questioning, was remanded to six-day ED custody by a special court on Saturday.
The ED move follows its raids on Wednesday at the residences and offices of Nagendra and Scheduled Tribes Development Corporation Chairman and Congress MLA Basanagouda Daddal in Bengaluru and Ballari. Their personal assistants were also questioned.
The scam got unravelled after P Chandrashekaran, the Corporation’s accounts superintendent who was involved in auditing and coordinating with Union Bank of India, committed suicide on May 26 this year leaving a six-page note detailing the fraud and the people involved in it. Nagendra, who was the Tribal Welfare Minister, subsequently resigned from his post on June 6.
In his note, Chandrashekaran claimed about an unauthorised transfer of Rs 187 crore belonging to the Corporation from its bank account and out of which Rs 88.62 crore was illegally moved to various accounts allegedly belonging to several IT companies and a Hyderabad-based cooperative bank among others, sources said.
Chandrasekharan named the Corporation’s now-suspended Managing Director J G Padmanabh, accounts officer Parashuram G Durugannavar, and Union Bank of India Chief Manager Suchismita Rawal in the note and maintained that the Minister had issued oral orders for transferring the funds.
The Karnataka Government, subsequently, constituted a CID SIT, which too questioned Nagendra and Daddal. So far, 11 people have been arrested and funds worth Rs 40 crore which were diverted to 18 bank accounts of fake companies have been seized. The police complaint filed by the ST Corporation officials stated that some of the corporation officials allegedly forged signatures and illegally transferred Rs 94,73,08,500 to various accounts. The Corporation did not receive any intimation about the transactions, it said.
The CBI has also registered a separate case on the basis of a complaint by the Union Bank of India which stated that Rs 89.63 crore public money was defrauded, and of which Rs 5 crore has been recovered. The investigation revealed that of the 18 accounts to which the money was transferred, nine were opened at RBL bank in Hyderabad on March 31.
