ED cracks down on 300 shell firms, searches at over 110 locations in 16 states
New Delhi: In one of its biggest operations in recent times, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday conducted raids in over 110 locations across the country in a major crackdown on about 300 shell companies.
“This is a part of our concerted plan of action in the fight against black money and is one of our biggest operations where almost our entire staff was employed. There will be questioning now and more searches are possible. These raids may continue,” ED director Karnal Singh told this newspaper.
Saturday’s raids were conducted across 16 states and in major metros and cities like Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Ahmedabad, Panaji, Kochi, Lucknow, Patna, Jaipur, Jalandhar, Srinagar, Indore, and Chandigarh where ED sleuths swooped down at market places, business centres, residential premises and even houses put up on rent.
It comes close on the heels of a recent PMO directive to check the illegal operations of such companies and entities that “do not have any substantial business but are suspected of having been used for laundering ill-gotten money and facilitating bogus foreign transactions”.
