The Enforcement Directorate (ED), Guwahati Zonal Office, has filed a Prosecution Complaint before the Special PMLA Court in Guwahati against former and present officials of NPCC Ltd. and directors of a private construction company on charges of money laundering under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.
The case relates to alleged bribery in the award of contracts worth approximately Rs 60.30 crore for the construction of border outposts along the India-Bangladesh border.
The ED has named the following accused in its Prosecution Complaint:
Rakesh Mohan Kotwal, Retired Zonal Manager, North East Region (IBBW), NPCC Ltd., Silchar; Latiful Pasha, Officer-in-Charge, Jalpaiguri Project Office, NPCC Ltd., West Bengal; Anish Baid and Binod Singhi, both Directors of M/s Shree Gautam Construction Company Limited; and M/s Jaichand Lal Singhi, Sunil Kumar, and M/s Shree Gautam Construction Company Limited as entities.
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The contracts in question were awarded by NPCC Ltd., on behalf of the Border Security Force (BSF), to Shree Gautam Construction Company Ltd. for nine Border Out Posts along the Indo-Bangladesh border.
Investigation revealed that Kotwal and Pasha demanded illegal gratification of approximately Rs 33 lakh — later negotiated down to Rs 30 lakh — from Anish Baid for the release of withheld running bills worth around Rs 2.24 crore.
To fulfill the bribe demand, Anish Baid, Binod Singhi, and their associate M/s Jaichand Lal Singhi arranged the transfer of Rs 25 lakh through hawala channels, routed from Silchar to Guwahati to Delhi.
On July 4, 2019, Rs 20.70 lakh was transferred from Shree Gautam Construction Company's account and Rs 5.17 lakh from M/s Jaichand Lal Singhi's account to M/s Vinit Distributors through banking channels.
The cash was ultimately delivered to Sunil Kumar at Hotel Deer Park in Delhi on July 14, 2019 — where the CBI intercepted the transaction and recovered Rs 25 lakh on the spot.
In a separate recovery on July 20, 2019, an additional Rs 15 lakh in alleged illegal gratification received by Kotwal from other contractors was found at Singhi Hyundai Showroom in Silchar. The cash had been kept there by an employee of Shree Gautam Construction Company on the instructions of Binod Singhi.
The ED launched its money laundering investigation on the basis of an FIR originally registered by the CBI's Anti-Corruption Branch in New Delhi, under provisions of the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.
The CBI had filed a chargesheet against nine accused persons on November 29, 2021.
Investigators also established that Kotwal and Pasha had demanded illegal gratification from several other NPCC contractors as well, beyond the transactions already documented.
The ED has stated that further investigation into the matter is ongoing.