BENGALURU: The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) arrested Anup Nagaral, director of Hoewelai Jinsu, Hong Kong, SAR, China Ltd, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002, in a case connected with fraud committed on banks under the guise of merchant trade.
The ED had initiated money laundering investigation on the basis of an FIR dated July 18, 2009, registered by High Grounds Police Station, Bengaluru. Nagaral has been sent to judicial custody till January 17 by the Special PMLA court in Bengaluru. He was named accused by the ED, in its chargesheet filed in March 2019 before the PMLA court.
He was earlier arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in December last year in the same case, after he returned to India and appeared before it. He was later enlarged on bail. According to the ED investigation, two companies — FMPL and FEIPL — did not honour the tripartite agreements they had entered into with the Spices Trading Corporation Ltd (STCL) and overseas buyers and sellers.
“The two companies had guaranteed the payments to be made by the overseas buyers. Chairman, FMPL and FEIPL, Naveen Sriram, and managing director Sudheer Sriram had executed deed of personal and corporate guarantee in favour of STCL, against the latter agreeing to provide finance for the merchandise trade transactions and this corporate guarantee could be invoked by STCL in the event of any default in repayment of amount due to STCL,” the ED said.
The STCL “established irrevocable LCs (letters of credit) for the usance period of 90 days. However, the LCs were devolved due to non-payment by overseas buyers which was guaranteed by FMPL and FEIPL, causing wrongful loss of USD 249.57 million to STCL”. ED had earlier attached immovable assets worth Rs 185.67 crore, located in Maharashtra, Punjab, New Delhi, Gujarat, Bengaluru and Ballari, under PMLA.