The ED had arrested CA Rajesh Agarwal on March 20 for providing accommodation entries of about Rs 60 lakh to a firm owned by Bharti and her husband, which appears to have routed black money via Shell Companies.
The central probe agency was acting on a chargesheet filed by the Serious Fraud Investigation Office against certain individuals and firms, alleging that they had provided “accommodation entries by accepting funds from their beneficiaries through mediators and converted the same into share premium transactions in the beneficiary company”.
On July 8, the ED had conducted raids on three farmhouses belonging to Misa, her husband and M/s Mishail Printers and Packers Private Limited, the firm under the lens for alleged money laundering. Soon after, Misa had deposed before the agency, during which she was questioned about her role in relation to the firm, her other finances and her links with CA Rajesh Agarwal. Shailesh too was grilled by the ED in the corruption case.
Misa Bharti, daughter of RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav, and her husband Shailesh Kumar, are being probed by the agency on suspicion of links to two Delhi-based businessmen brothers, Surendra Kumar Jain and Virendra Jain, and others who are alleged to have laundered Rs 8,000 crore using over 90 shell companies. The Jain brothers were arrested by the ED earlier under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
According to ED officials, it was detected that 1,20,000 shares of M/s Mishail Printers and Packers Private Limited were bought during 2007-08 at a rate of Rs 100 per share by four shell companies, before being allegedly bought back by Misa at Rs 10 per share.
Shell companies are firms set up with nominal paid up capital, high reserves, and surplus on account of receipt of high share premium, investment in unlisted companies and no dividend income or high amount of cash-in-hand.
The ED is the third agency probing alleged financial irregularities by the Lalu Prasad family after the CBI and the Income Tax department which recently attached benami assets worth about Rs 180 crore (market value) in its investigation against them.
(With PTI inputs)
Source : timesofindia
