ED raids ex NOIDA CEO, builders in fraud case; seizes ₹42 cr worth of jewellery and cash

New Delhi, Sep 20 (PTI) The ED has seized cash, gold and diamond jewellery worth more than ₹42 crore after it raided multiple locations linked to retired NOIDA Authority CEO Mohinder Singh and builders in a money laundering case linked to the alleged duping of home buyers' funds.

The federal probe agency searched premises in Delhi, Noida and Meerut in Uttar Pradesh as well as Chandigarh and Goa on September 17-18 as part of an investigation into alleged fraud by Hacienda Projects Private Limited, its promoters and directors and related entities. The fraud, to the tune of ₹426 crore, was against home buyers of the Lotus 300 Projects in Noida, the Enforcement Directorate said in a statement.

Office and residential premises of the company, its promoters and related entities such as HPPL, Cloud 9 Projects Pvt. Ltd., Surpreet Singh Suri, Vidur Bhardwaj, Nirmal Singh, Aditya Gupta, Ashish Gupta and that of retired IAS officer Singh were searched, it said.

The money laundering case was filed by the ED on the directions of the Allahabad High Court against Hacienda Projects Pvt Ltd and its promoters for "diversion and siphoning off the hard-earned money of investors and home buyers and ultimately not providing them the promised flats".

The Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police had initially filed FIRs in this case.

The ED said cash and jewellery worth ₹42.56 crore was seized during the searches. This included "unexplained" cash of ₹85 lakh, gold and diamond jewellery worth ₹29.35 crore,a solitaire diamond worth ₹5.26 crore, diamond jewellery of ₹7.1 crore and documents of property worth crores of rupees.