ED raids premises of Ashok Gehlot’s son, brother and several other Congressmen amid Rajasthan Crisis

According to ED sources, the company run by Agrasain Gehlot had sold the subsidised fertiliser “muriate of potash” or MoP to companies, who then exported it while it is banned for exports.

Indian Potash Ltd is the authorised importer of MoP and the chemical is distributed to farmers at subsidised rates.

Between 2007 and 2009, Agrasain Gehlot’s firm Anupam Krishi, which was an authorised dealer of Indian Potash Ltd, bought MoP at subsidised rates and instead of distributing it to farmers, the company allegedly sold it to a few others who in turn exported it to Malaysia and Singapore in the guise of “industrial salt”, investigators said.

At a time when the Congress is wading through quite the political crisis in Rajasthan, the Enforcement Directorate has also gone after Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s son Vaibhav over an investment deal struck between his business partner and a Mauritius investor.

A hotel in Jaipur, run by Vaibhav’s partner R.K. Sharma, had been on the ED’s radar over a Rs 96-crore investment in it by a Mauritius firm. The ED has said that this deal is a possible case of “round-tripping.”

Round tripping refers to money that leaves the country though various channels and makes its way back as foreign investment.

According to sources in the agency, the hotel records with the Registrar of Companies have been scanned and the preliminary probe into the hotel’s shareholding pattern and Vaibhav’s deal with Sharma has revealed that shares that were originally allotted for Rs 10 each, were later allotted to an “investor” from Mauritius for around Rs 40,000 per share.

For this, the ED has already summoned Sharma and others involved in the business, and is now planning to question Vaibhav too.

On Monday, the Income Tax Department conducted raids at properties of two close aides of chief minister Ashok Gehlot in Jaipur.

They are identified as Dharmendra Rathore and Rajiv Arora. Rathore is a former chairman of the Rajasthan seeds corporation while Arora is vice president of the Congress and owner of Amrapali jewels.

Sources say that the raids were based on complaints of tax evasion and were being conducted at Delhi and Mumbai as well.

The Congress said that the raids are an attempt by the BJP to topple the ruling Congress government. “The Income Tax department, Enforcement Directorate and CBI are all ‘frontal departments’ of the BJP, their raids cannot topple Rajasthan government,” said Surjewala.

The department later claimed that it had gathered incriminating documents and digital records which show mass trading in cash.

Earlier in Manipur, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had summoned former chief minister and Congress leader Okram Ibobi Singh at a time when he was leading the move to replace the BJP-led coalition government in Manipur.