Bank 'fraud': ED attaches over Rs 440 crore assets of ex-promoters of Kwality
New Delhi, Jan 16 (PTI): The Enforcement Directorate Thursday said it has attached assets worth more than Rs 440 crore in Delhi, Haryana and Punjab as part of an alleged bank loan fraud linked money laundering case against former promoters of dairy major Kwality Ltd.
An order was issued under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) for the provisional attachment of a 12,000 square yards farmhouse located at DLF Chhatarpur, residential properties at Vasant Vihar and Punjabi Bagh in Delhi and some residential plots at Karnal (Haryana) and Mohali (Punjab), the federal agency said.
The total value of these properties is Rs 442.85 crore.
These properties were "owned" by former promoters Siddhant Gupta and Sanjay Dhingra of Kwality Limited through "dummy" companies. The driver and security guard of the said promoters were the directors in such companies, the ED said.
The agency had raided 15 locations in Delhi-NCR in November 2024 as part of the action against former promoters and directors of the company -- Sanjay Dhingra and Siddhant Gupta -- apart from some "shell" (paper) companies related to them.
Kwality has been liquidated and is now with new owners.
The ED case stems from a September, 2020 CBI FIR filed against the said promoters and Kwality, which was engaged in processing and trading of milk, ice cream and other dairy products, for alleged loan fraud of Rs 1,400 crore against a consortium of banks.
The then promoters and directors, the agency said in a statement, "fudged" the books of accounts to show higher sales and debtors.
"Huge amounts of trading (sales/ purchase) were made without actual physical deliveries or receipt of the goods at factory premises. It was also noticed that sham companies/firms operated through implanted/dummy owners were used to divert the bank funds," the ED alleged.
The funds "diverted" through the said modus operandi were circulated and layered so as to conceal their origin and routed to different accounts as per the instructions of the promoters for purposes not intended by the banks, it said.
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UP man gets life term for electrocuting mentally challenged wife to death in Bareilly
Bareilly (UP) (PTI): A local court here has sentenced a man to life imprisonment for murdering his mentally challenged wife by repeatedly electrocuting her while she was tied to a cot, lawyers said on Thursday.
Additional district government counsel Harendra Singh Rathore said Additional Sessions Judge Avinash Kumar Singh on Wednesday convicted Vinod Kumar (45) for killing his wife, Satyavati, in Chaina village of Bareilly district and imposed a fine of Rs 15,000 on him.
According to the prosecution, he was allegedly frustrated with his wife Satyavati's mental illness and often assaulted her.
Rathore said the prosecution examined nine witnesses to establish the charges against him.
As per court records, on the night of May 1-2, 2022, when Satyavati was asleep, Vinod tied her hands and legs to a cot using ropes and then connected an aluminium cable to an electric board to repeatedly administer electric shocks to her.
"She writhed in pain, but the accused continued to electrocute her until she died," the prosecution said.
The court observed that the murder was carried out in an inhuman manner.
After committing the crime, the accused threw the rope and cable on the roof and left for work at a brick kiln around 2 am to create a false alibi.
He later tried to mislead the police and the victim's family by claiming that Satyavati, whose mental condition was unstable, had accidentally died by suicide after grabbing a live electric wire.
However, the victim's brother, Sanjeev, a resident of Shahjahanpur district, suspected foul play and lodged an FIR under sections 498A (husband subjecting wife to cruelty) and 302 (murder) of the Indian Penal Code at Nawabganj police station.
During the trial, the prosecution relied on the post-mortem report prepared by Dr Faraz Anwar, who stated that multiple electrocution marks found on different parts of the victim's body could not have been self-inflicted.
The police also recovered the rope and electric wire used in the crime on the accused's identification, officials said.
