Published
Jan 4, 2019
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ED links Mehul Choksi’s Thai factory to PNB fraud case

Published
Jan 4, 2019

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) announced that it has attached a factory in Thailand valued at over Rs 13 crore ($2 million) and belonging to Mehul Choksi’s jewellery business Gitanjali Group to its Punjab National Bank (PNB) fraud case.

The ED has attached a factory in Thailand as part of fugitive jeweller Mehul Choksi’s assets - Gitanjal Gems- Facebook


The ED announced on January 4 that it has issued a provisional order for attachment of Choksi’s Thailand factory under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). 

"Investigations under PMLA revealed that Abbeycrest (Thailand) Limited is the beneficiary of the LoUs (Letters of Undertaking) issued fraudulently and unauthorisedly from the PNB to the tune of Rs 92.3 crore,” the ED said in a statement, as reported by the Press Trust of India.

“During probe, this overseas property has been identified and after gathering concrete evidence of ownership it has been attached.” 

Abbeycrest, a company of the Gitanjali group, was investigated by the ED prior to its attachment as part of its probe into Choksi and his nephew Nirav Modi who are both accused of leading one of the largest scale frauds in India’s banking history. The next step will see ED investigators issued with Letters Rogatories (judicial requests) to formalise the attachment of the Thai factory as a foreign based asset. 

"With this attachment, the value of attachment/seizure in the PNB scam is to the tune of of Rs 4,765 crore (approx). Further investigation is in process," said the ED.

Both Choksi and Modi are refusing to return to India to stand trial in the case. 

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