The agency, which earlier registered a
case under foreign exchange laws in this deal, decided to lodge a
criminal case to trace the bribe money involving middlemen and other
people named by CBI in its FIR filed in March 2013.
Taking
cognizance of the more-than-a-year-old CBI complaint, the agency has
booked Tyagi, his family members, European nationals Carlo Gerosa,
Christian Michel and Guido Haschke, four companies - Italy-based
Finmeccanica, UK-based AgustaWestland and Chandigarh-based IDS Infotech
and Aeromatrix, two companies based in Mauritius and Tunisia, few other
firms and unknown persons in its criminal complaint filed under the
provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
A total of 21 entities have been named by ED in the case.
Investigators of the agency, sources said, would use legal channels to obtain court documents from Italy.
Sources
said that the agency will soon initiate the process of recording of
statements of these people even as it dispatches Letters Rogatory (LRs),
or judicial requests to a few European countries, including Italy,
seeking their cooperation.
Sources also said that the agency
has already zeroed in on some of the immovable and movable assets of the
accused which will be attached under the provisions of the laundering
laws.
In order to track the alleged ‘bribe money’ in this
deal, it was important for the agency to register a criminal case as
that would be conducive for it to seek cooperation from other countries
under existing treaties and tax information exchange protocols, the
sources added.
The supply of 12 VVIP helicopters from
AgustaWestland came under the scanner after Italian authorities alleged
that bribe was paid by the company to clinch the deal.
The
Italian prosecutor who carried out the preliminary inquiry alleged that
the CEO of Finmeccanica, the parent company of UK-based AgustaWestland,
had used the services of middlemen to bribe Indian officials.
CBI
has already approached Defence Ministry seeking relevant documents and
other vital details available with them in this regard.
The
documents, sources said, would help both the probes registered by ED -
of foreign exchange violations (under the Foreign Exchange Management
Act) and the laundering case filed on Friday.
Sources said that both cases registered by ED would be looked into separately.
The
agency has also got in touch with some banks which were found to have
been used to channel funds of private firms and individuals allegedly
involved in the case.
CBI's allegation against the former air
chief is that he reduced the flying ceiling of the helicopter so that
AgustaWestland was included in the bids.
Tyagi has dismissed the allegations against him and denied any wrongdoing.
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