ED attaches Rs 1,000 cr assets in C’garh liquor scam

Raipur: Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached properties worth over Rs 1,000 crore in connection with its investigation into the alleged Chhattisgarh liquor scam, intensifying its crackdown on what it described as a deeply entrenched syndicate involving bureaucrats, businessmen and excise-linked entities.

In a statement issued on Monday, ED’s Raipur zonal office said its investigation found that a liquor syndicate led by businessman Anwar Dhebar and retired IAS officer Anil Tuteja manipulated Chhattisgarh’s excise system between 2019 and 2023 to generate proceeds of crime exceeding Rs 2,883 crore.

The alleged racket involved the artificial inflation of liquor procurement rates, the clandestine manufacture of unaccounted liquor, and the extraction of commissions through FL-10A licences granted to favoured entities, the agency said.

ED had issued three provisional attachment orders under PMLA. One of the key attachments includes immovable properties allegedly linked to businessman Vikas Agrawal and Anwar Dhebar. Agrawal acted as the syndicate’s “ground-level financial manager”, routing commissions collected from distilleries and FL-10A licensees to Dhebar, the agency said.

Several benami properties in Raipur, including plots, residential properties and land parcels allegedly held through shell firms, were attached as proceeds of crime.

ED also attached a premium hotel property owned by a private limited company in North Goa’s Anjuna. The agency claimed the hotel, valued at around Rs 110 crore, was acquired entirely through unaccounted cash generated from the liquor scam and transported at the instance of Chaitanya Baghel, son of then chief minister Bhupesh Baghel.

The third attachment targeted bank accounts, shares and mutual funds belonging to three FL-10A licence-holder companies. These firms were allegedly forced to part with 50-60% of their profits to the syndicate, amounting to nearly Rs 51 crore.

ED added that it has filed its sixth supplementary prosecution complaint before the special PMLA court in Raipur, naming four more accused — Vijay Bhatia, T Bhuvaneshwar Rao, Probir Sharma and Nikhil Chandrakar. With this, the total number of accused in the case has risen to 85, the agency said.