New Delhi: As part of its investigation into the Reliance group companies formerly controlled by businessman Anil Ambani, the Enforcement Directorate on Monday attached the 132-acre Dhirubhai Ambani Knowledge City (DAKC) campus, worth approximately Rs 4,462 crore.
Sources in the agency suggested more such actions are expected in the near future and that a prosecution complaint will most likely be filed against Anil Ambani and other office bearers of his group firms.
“These attachments are just the beginning after carrying out the investigation. More attachment proceedings are expected shortly. A prosecution complaint is imminent against him,” an ED official said. A prosecution complaint is the agency’s version of a chargesheet.
The latest attachment (DAKC) comes after the agency attached 42 immovable properties, including sea-facing residential premises of Anil Ambani in Mumbai’s Pali Hill, with a total value of over Rs 4,400 crore.
The sprawling DAKC campus, located in Navi Mumbai on the outskirts of Mumbai, was acquired by Anil Ambani after a family settlement between him and Mukesh Ambani, the chairman and managing director of Reliance Industries Limited, in 2005. The erstwhile Reliance Communications, managed by the Reliance Group under Anil Ambani, owned the campus. After Anil resigned as director of Reliance Communications, the ownership went to subsidiaries of RCom, which is undergoing insolvency.
Till July 2007, thousands of Reliance Industries employees were also working from the campus as part of a lease agreement between RIL and Anil Ambani.
The federal probe agency has turned the heat on Anil Ambani in the last few months, expediting an investigation into several cases of fund diversion from banks for personal purposes and round-tripping (when a company sells an asset and then buys it back at nearly the same price to falsely report sales and growth).
ED’s money laundering probe has uncovered large-scale lapses and regulatory violations by at least three group companies once managed by Anil Ambani, including Reliance Communications, Reliance Commercial Finance Ltd., and Reliance Home Finance Ltd.
“RCom and its group companies availed loans from domestic and foreign lenders from the period of 2010-2012 onwards, of which a total amount of Rs 40,185 crores is outstanding. Five banks have declared the loan accounts of the group as fraud,” an agency spokesperson said Monday.
The agency has found that loans taken from banks by group entities of Anil Ambani were allegedly diverted to other group firms which were subsequently used for repayment of loans of the other firms.
“In particular, RCom and its group companies diverted over Rs 13,600 crore for evergreening of loans; over Rs 12,600 crore was diverted to connected parties and over Rs 1,800 crore was invested into FDs/MFs etc., which was substantially liquidated for rerouting to group entities. A massive misuse of bill discounting for the purpose of funnelling funds to connected parties has also been detected by the ED. Certain loans were siphoned off outside India through foreign outward remittances,” the spokesperson further said.
The development comes months after ED officials questioned Ambani on 5 August as part of an investigation into the diversion of loan funds.
Ambani also faced similar action from the Central Bank of India, as it booked him and Reliance Communications after the State Bank of India tagged its account as fraudulent and complained to the ED. The agency filed a fresh case and raided premises, including his residence. The CBI also filed a chargesheet in the two cases it had filed against him and Rana Kapoor, the former Managing Director of Yes Bank, in the loan diversion cases linked to the bank during Kapoor’s tenure.
(Edited by Viny Mishra)