New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Jet Airways founder Naresh Goyal after questioning him on Friday (September 1), India Today reported.
Its report added that ED officials took Goyal in for questioning as he was preparing to be questioned by the Serious Fraud Investigation Office.
The ED, a federal financial crimes agency, had conducted searches at six to seven premises linked to Goyal in July this year.
It filed a money laundering case against him and others based on a previous case the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) filed in May.
Goyal’s Jet Airways has been accused of defrauding the Bengaluru-based Canara Bank of Rs 538 crore.
Canara Bank had lodged a complaint alleging that it had sanctioned credit limits and loans to Jet Airways to the tune of Rs 848.86 crore, of which an amount of Rs 538.62 crore is outstanding, news agency PTI reported.
Its complaint also alleged on the basis of a forensic audit that Goyal’s companies committed “glaring irregularities” in their transactions with the bank, the Indian Express reported.
“All the (suspicious) transactions point towards cheating and misappropriation of funds by the borrower and siphoning of funds borrowed from banks being utilised for purposes unrelated to the operations of borrower, to the detriment of the financial health of the entity and/or the lender,” the CBI, which also searched Goyal’s properties, said in its FIR.
PTI reported that Goyal is expected to be produced before a special money laundering court on Saturday (August 2) where the ED will seek his custody.
In February this year, the Bombay high court had asked the ED why the Enforcement Case Information Report, the ED’s equivalent of an FIR, in an earlier cheating and forgery case against Goyal and his wife could not be quashed.
Justice Revati Mohite-Dere and Justice Prithviraj K Chavan had granted interim relief and said that no coercive action can be taken against the Goyals in the case, Indian Express had reported.
The bench had said proceedings against the couple were illegal.