Raipur
The Enforcement Directorate, which is probing the illegal coal levy scam, has started searching at the liquor barons of Chhattisgarh. In the guerilla operation going on since this morning, the ED has targeted liquor traders as well as officials associated with the Excise Department ranging from Raipur, Durg-Bhilai to Bilaspur.
The ED raided the premises of liquor barons Amolak Singh Bhatia, Anwar Dhebar, Vinod Bihari, Saurabh Kedia, Manjit Chawla, among others, as well as the premises of Excise Department officials AP Tripathi, ADO Janardan Kaurav. About two years ago, Income Tax raided Tripathi’s locations and a large number of documents were acquired.
Different teams of ED had reached the locations of people associated with the liquor business and excise department at six on Wednesday morning. The ED prohibited the movement of people in all the houses taken under its radar. The CRPF jawanslaid the siege. Sources revealed that along with sifting through the documents, the ED is also conducting strict examinations. However, the details of the inquiry have not been revealed at the moment.
This was the second day of ED action. On Tuesday, the ED raided more than 16 locations of businessmen and officials including major industrialists in Raipur, Bilaspur, Raigarh and Bhilai. ED’s investigation went on till late night. During this, the ED raided the offices of industrialist Kamal Sarda, land broker Suresh Bande, CA Pramod Jain, KD Kunjam, Director of the Mineral Department, Industries Department Officer Shukla, Congress treasurer Ram Gopal Agrawal’s son Vaibhav Agrawaland son-in-law Nitin.
