New Delhi: Jharkhand chief minister, Hemant Soren, has been summoned by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) for questioning in an money laundering case, official sources told the news agency PTI.
Soren has been instructed to appear before the agency on August 14 to record his statement under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
It must be noted that Soren was also questioned by the ED last November, however, in connection with another money laundering case linked to alleged illegal mining in the state.
Although there has been no official word yet on the reason for questioning Soren this time around, Deccan Herald reported, quoting sources, that he will be questioned for his alleged involvement in an alleged defence land scam in the state.
The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) Jharkhand unit chief, Deepak Prakash, demanded Soren’s resignation, noting that he actively connived with “corrupt bureaucrats” in the state resulting in the alleged scam, the newspaper said.
“We had requested the ED to investigate the case. Today, the result is that after the illegal mining case, the Jharkhand chief minister has been summoned by ED in connection with money laundering with respect to land held by the Army and others,” the newspaper quoted Prakash as saying. Prakash claimed that he was the first to expose the alleged scam.
Meanwhile, the ED has already been investigating more than a dozen land deals, including one related to defence land, wherein a group of land mafia, middlemen, and bureaucrats allegedly connived to forge deeds and documents dating as long back as 1932.
A special PMLA court had already arrested Jharkhand IAS officer Chhavi Ranjan in connection with the alleged land scam. He was questioned for nearly 10 hours on April 24. The probe agency carried out searches on April 13 at premises linked to Ranjan in Jharkhand, West Bengal, and Bihar. Several people were arrested after the raids.
A day before ED summoned him, Soren, on Monday, August 7, had accused the Narendra Modi government at the Centre of misusing federal agencies to disturb his government in the state, The Telegraph reported.
Soren’s Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) is part of the 26-party opposition INDIA alliance.