Patra Chawl Case: ED Grants Shiv Sena MP Sanjay Raut Exemption Till 7 August
Sanjay Raut has denied any wrongdoing and said that he is being targeted due to political vendetta.
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Shiv Sena leader Sanjay Raut, who was earlier scheduled to appear before the Enforcement Directorate on Wednesday, 20 July, has been granted time to do so till 7 August.
Raut had sought exemption from appearing before the probe agency on Wednesday, saying that he would be have to be in Delhi for the ongoing Monsoon Session of Parliament.
His lawyer, Vikrant Sabne, said that ED has granted Raut time till 7 August as they had sought the same, adding that Raut would appear on the next date.
Raut is being interrogated for alleged irregularities relating to the redevelopment of Patra Chawl, a housing complex in Mumbai, and related transactions involving his wife and 'associates', officials said on Tuesday, 19 July.
Raut was also summoned by ED on 1 July and questioned for over 10 hours.
"It is our duty to go in front of the central agencies if they have any doubt in their minds so that people do not have any doubt in their minds about us. We were questioned for 10 hours and we gave full co-operation," said Raut after coming out of ED's office.
He further added that he is 'fearless and undaunted' as he has 'not done anything wrong in life'.
The Case
In April, the ED attached Raut's property including a plot in Alibaug and a flat in Mumbai's Dadar, as a part of the investigation.
"ED provisionally attached assets totalling Rs 11.15 crore, in form of land held by Pravin Raut, ex-director of Guru Ashish Construction Pvt Ltd, a Dadar flat of Varsha Raut, wife of Sanjay Raut & Alibaug plots jointly held by Varsha Raut & Swapna Patkar, wife of Sujit Patkar," the ED had said in a statement in April.
Guru Ashish Construction Pvt Ltd was involved in the redevelopment of the Patra 'chawl,' which had 672 tenants in tenements on 47 acres belonging to the Maharashtra Housing Area Development Authority (MHADA), the ED had said earlier. Guru Ashish is a subsidiary company of the Housing Development Infrastructure Ltd (HDIL).
The ED claims that according to the agreement the developer had to provide flats to 672 tenants and develop flats for MHADA. Thereafter, the remaining area was to be sold by the developer.
"The directors of Guru Ashish Constructions mislead MHADA and managed to sell the FSI (floor space index) to nine developers and collected about Rs 901.79 crore without constructing the rehab portion for 672 displaced tenants and MHADA portion," it said.
The ED probe, conducted so far, found that "around Rs 100 crore were transferred from HDIL to the account of Pravin Raut."
This amount was further "diverted" by Pravin Raut to various accounts of his close associates, family member, his business entities etc, it said.
ED's investigations found that an amount of Rs 55 lakh was transferred back by Varsha Raut to Madhuri Raut. There are various other transactions too, it said.
(With inputs from PTI and ANI.)
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