Meat exporter arrested over money laundering

New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has arrested Kanpur-based controversial meat exporter Moin Akhtar Qureshi in connection with its money-laundering probe against him and others.

Sources said Mr Qureshi was arrested late Friday night after he was called for questioning. The meat exporter was arrested under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). “Qureshi was evasive during examination and could not explain some new evidence presented before him. He was not cooperating in the probe,” sources said. He has been questioned several times in the past by the agency probing him after it registered two FIRs under the PMLA. Former CBI director A.P. Singh has also been named in the latest FIR. Mr Qureshi was arrested in connection with the inquiry into the second FIR, they said. Earlier in 2015, the ED lodged a PMLA case against Qureshi based on an Income Tax prosecution complaint.

The ED stated its probe revealed facts that “constitute omission and commission of certain acts on the part of certain public servants holding high positions in collusion with Qureshi, thereby a huge amount of illegal money was found to have been transacted”.

“The records collected by the ED from the income tax (I-T) department, in the form of BBM (BlackBerry Messenger) messages, has “revealed that Qureshi has taken huge amount of money from different persons for obtaining undue favours from public servants after exercising his personal influence”, it said.

BBM messages exchanged between Qureshi and the accused persons involved in other criminal cases and also the persons who wanted to seek undue favours from the other investigating agencies of government by getting them off the hook, the statement said.

There were also BBM exchanges between Qureshi and former CBI chief Singh, which are being probed both by the ED and the CBI as part of their separate criminal investigations. In this way, the ED said, Qureshi “obtained huge amount of money and it was obtained in the name of government servants/political persons holding public office and the said public servants illegally either obtained the money for themselves or through their kin.” The agency said an analysis of the BBM messages retrieved from mobile phones of Qureshi and his associates revealed that hawala operators were also used to transfer bribe money (belonging to government officials) to foreign locations like Paris and the UK. “Qureshi has extorted crores of rupees from a businessman from Hyderabad in lieu of the help provided. He was found involved in hawala transactions through Delhi-based hawala operators,” the statement said. Through them, the agency alleged, the money was transferred to Dubai and then to Paris, London, the US, Hong Kong, Italy and Switzerland.