New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has provisionally attached Rs 124.57 crore land parcels and farmhouses linked to three companies associated with M3M, a Gurugram-based real estate company, as part of its money laundering investigation against Religare Finvest Ltd. The properties are in the “posh” areas of Delhi and Gurugram.
Among the immovable properties provisionally attached are 430 acres of land parcels in Haryana’s Gurugram and Faridabad linked to M3M group’s Kenwood Mercantile Pvt Ltd and Goodfaith Builders Pvt Ltd, the ED said in a statement Tuesday. The ED has also provisionally attached the properties of a third company, RS Infrastructure Pvt Ltd, whose shares were with M3M India Holdings, an M3M group company.
The money laundering case stems from cases filed by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police against Religare Finvest. This latest order by a special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court is the third of such orders for attaching properties.
The ED said M3M India Holdings inflated the valuation of land owned by RS Infrastructure Pvt Ltd and sold overpriced shares at a value of approximately Rs 726 crore to erstwhile Lowe Realty Pvt Ltd, which currently operates as Lowe Infra and Wellness Pvt Ltd. Lowe Realty Pvt Ltd allegedly borrowed the money from the Religare group of companies.
The ED said the partners of M3M India Holdings — Roop Kumar Bansal, his brother Basant Bansal, Basant’s wife Abha Bansal, and their son Pankaj Bansal — generated and received proceeds of crime worth approximately Rs 500 crore by sale of the shares at Rs 726 crore.
The EOW, in October 2019, arrested former Religare Finvest promoter Shivinder Singh and former company executives like chief managing director Sunil Godhwani, chief financial officer Anil Saxena, and managing director Kavi Arora in a corporate loan book fraud case.
M3M directors arrested in another case
Last year, the ED arrested M3M directors Pankaj Bansal and Basant Bansal in connection with another case filed by the Haryana Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) against a Panchkula court special judge. However, later in 2023, the Supreme Court granted them bail.
The case related to a judge, Sudhir Parmar, who allegedly showed favouritism while adjudicating a money laundering case involving the M3M group and real estate company IREO. Parmar sought “undue advantage” from the M3M directors and IREO group proprietor Lalit Goyal, said the FIR filed by the Haryana ACB on 17 May 2023.
The ED investigation into the money laundering case showed the M3M group received nearly Rs 400 crore from the IREO group “through several shell companies in multiple layers” in one of the transactions between the two companies. IREO, in its books, showed the transactions as payments towards land development rights. The land was M3M owned and had a Rs 4 crore market value.
“M3M group initially sold the development rights of the said land to 5 shell companies for a payment of Rs 10 crore. It was claimed that the 5 companies are unrelated companies. Investigations show that the 5 shell companies were operated by M3M group,” the ED said in a 5 June 2023 statement.
“The 5 shell companies thereafter immediately sold the development rights of the same land to IREO Group for about Rs 400 Crore. After receiving the amount of Rs 400 Crore from IREO Group, the 5 shell companies transferred the said amounts immediately to M3M Group through multiple shell companies and layers,” the ED statement added.
The ED has alleged that the M3M group owned and operated all the shell companies under the directions of the Bansals.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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