The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday registered a case of money laundering against former Maharashtra Home minister Anil Deshmukh. The case, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), was registered based on the FIR filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), said people familiar with the development. The CBI case claims that ex-Maharashtra Home minister Deshmukh and “unknown others” had used their official position to obtain an undue advantage, as well as influenced the transfers and postings in the Mumbai Police, as alleged by former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh. The ED was probing the financial aspects of the CBI case, as the central anti-money laundering agency is mandated to do so in any scheduled offence.
Param Bir Singh had alleged that Deshmukh, when he was the Maharashtra Home minister, had asked the then assistant police inspector Sachin Vaze to collect Rs 100 crore from hotels, bars, and restaurants in Mumbai. Vaze, later suspended, is currently behind bars in the 25 February Antilia explosives scare case as well as the alleged murder of businessman Mansukh Hiran on 5 March. The Bombay High Court had asked the premier anti-corruption agency to look into the allegations against Anil Deshmukh as part of a preliminary inquiry. Later, the case was converted into a regular First Information Report (FIR) and the agency teams raided the former Maharashtra home minister›s residences in Mumbai and Nagpur last Saturday. The ED has said that it was «looking into» the CBI FIR, considering that the allegations involving a Rs 100 crore sum each month are «huge» and warrants a case of public importance. The central probe agency may now summon Deshmukh for questioning apart from others, they said. The ED case comes after the CBI first carried out a preliminary enquiry, followed by filing a regular case, on the orders of the Bombay High Court that asked it to look into the allegations of bribery made against Deshmukh by Param Bir Singh.