Enforcement Directorate raids Maharashtra firm, attaches city land

Hyderabad: Around 47.39 acres of urban land parcels located on the outskirts of Hyderabad, owned by Mumbai-based company, M/s Parekh Aluminex Ltd, have been provisionally attached by the Enforcement Directorate.

The registration price of the large chunk of attached land is Rs 46.97 crore, however, its market value will amount to many crores. The company’s promoter Deepen Parekh, and other directors, have been booked by the CBI for defaulting on paying a consortium of banks (20) Rs 2,297 crore.

Following this, the ED on Wednesday conducted searches at 10 locations in Mumbai belonging to M/s Parekh Aluminex Ltd. The searches were in connection with a bank fraud case under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA).

Simultaneously ED has initiated the process of Provisional Attachment of Proceeds of Crime. And the first attachment was an open land parcel of land located on the outskirts of Hyderabad.

Investigations conducted by the ED found that the company has diverted the loan amounts taken for manufacturing purposes to non-manufacturing related activities with an intention to defraud the banks and to get personal benefits for the promoter and directors and their associates. Evidence gathered so far has revealed that Rs 1,557.45 crore of the loan amount was siphoned off to various entities owned by the company.

According to the CBI sources, the company had diverted a large  amount of the loan taken from the banks into real estate business. Sources said the land purchased in Hyderabad was one of the properties the company promoters bought from the loan money meant for manufacturing units. The CBI has registered six FIRs in separate cases involving Indian Overseas Bank and Dena Bank and others involving a total amount of Rs 2,297 crore. The Economic Offences wing of the CBI, Mumbai, has separately registered two cases against the company for defrauding the Federal Bank and Axis Bank of a total amount of Rs 390 crore approximately.

The company is engaged in manufacturing and export of aluminium foil containers and aluminium foil rolls.