New Delhi: Continuing its searches against Sanjeev Lal, the officer on special duty (OSD) to Jharkhand’s Rural Development Minister Alamgir Alam, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) Wednesday carried out searches at his chamber in the ministry and recovered another tranche of cash, ThePrint has learnt.
A source in the agency told ThePrint that the searches at the ministry lasted nearly three hours and cash worth Rs 1.75 lakh was recovered from his office drawer.
This latest series of searches commenced Monday when the ED uncovered Rs 32.20 crore stashed at the residence of Jahangir Alam, Lal’s domestic help. The following day, the agency carried out searches at Lal’s residence in Ranchi and recovered cash worth Rs 10.05 lakh. The same day, the ED also seized Rs 2.93 crore from yet another close associate of Lal in Ranchi.
Both Jahangir and Alam were arrested Tuesday and sent to ED custody.
Alamgir, a Congress MLA representing the Pakur assembly constituency, has served in both the governments of Hemant Soren and Champai Soren. Previously, he held the position of rural development minister, alongside the additional charge of parliamentary affairs minister in the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM)-led coalition government in the state.
According to the remand application filed by the agency Tuesday seeking custody of Lal and Alam, the case originates from a 2019 FIR filed by the anti-corruption bureau (ACB) in Jamshedpur, against a junior engineer named Suresh Prasad Verma. Employed in the state’s road construction department, Verma was caught accepting a bribe from a contractor.
The Jamshedpur ACB raided Verma’s residence and seized, among other things, Rs 2.67 crore from an almirah in the house, which was rented to a man named Alok Ranjan.
The ACB filed a chargesheet against Verma and Ranjan and the ED a registered money laundering case on 17 September, 2020, to probe the matter.
Sources in ED told ThePrint that Ranjan had accepted that the money recovered from the rented accommodation belonged to Veerendra Kumar Ram, who was serving as chief engineer in state’s rural works department.
The ED in its remand application added that Lal was discovered to be orchestrating a bribery scheme through Ram, who was receiving kickbacks in the form of a 1.5 percent commission on tender values, which were then being distributed among senior officials and politicians within the department.
Ram was arrested by the ED in February 2023 and the agency has also filed a prosecution complaint against him and others in the same case.
“It is pertinent to mention that two vehicles were found at the premises under the use of Sanjeev Lal and the said vehicles were registered in the name of Jahangir Alam, one of which has been funded by Sanjeev Lal himself, as disclosed by Jahangir Alam in his statement, which clearly establishes that Sanjeev Lal has close nexus with Jahangir Alam,” the ED alleged in its remand application moved in court to seek Lal and Alam’s custody.
“Thus, it is ascertained that Sanjeev Lal takes care of the collection of commission on behalf of some influential persons and plays a pivotal role in managing the tenders and collection of commission from engineers, also the said percentage of commission is distributed in a mechanised manner to higher-ups of government. Further, during the investigation, names of senior bureaucrats and politicians have emerged which is being investigated by the complainant. It is submitted that several officials from top to bottom of the Rural Development Department are involved in this nexus and the huge payments were usually received in cash which were later laundered which needs to be unearthed,” the agency further alleged.
(Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri)
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