The Ahmedabad zonal office of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Monday said it filed a prosecution complaint (PC) against journalist Mahesh Prabhudan Langa under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) before a PMLA special court in the city on April 17. The court took cognizance of the PC on the same day. In a statement on Monday, the ED said that it had initiated an investigation against Langa on the basis of an FIR registered by the Detection of Crime (DCB) police station of the Ahmedabad city police for cheating and criminal breach of trust. Further, another FIR was registered against Langa by Satellite police station, Ahmedabad for extortion. Subsequently, Langa was arrested under Section 19 of the PMLA by the central agency in the matter and is currently in judicial custody. The agency, in a statement, said, "The investigation revealed that Mahesh Prabhudan Langa is involved in cheating and extortion of money by leveraging his alleged connections in the media. He threatened to tarnish the Complainants’ reputations by publishing defamatory news articles unless they paid him large sums of money. This form of media manipulation was found central to his extortion activities, which caused an undue loss to the tune lakhs of rupees to various individuals." Accordingly, the ED conducted a probe, which, it said, established the trail of proceeds of crime generated by Langa, and the same was attached vide provisional attachment order dated April 9. The assets include immovable property in the form of an office, located in Ahmedabad. On October 29 last year, Ahmedabad CP G S Malik had said that Langa had been booked for alleged cheating and criminal intimidation. The complaint was lodged by one Pranay Shah, the owner of Khushi Advertising, who had given Langa money in exchange for services besides paying him for a party for his wife Kavita Langa, Malik had said. Shah had stated that he was duped of Rs 28,68,250. The other case was lodged at Satellite police station on January 23 this year based on a complaint by Janak Arjun Thakor, 32, a farmer and land broker and a resident of Daskroi taluka. Langa was booked for allegedly extorting Rs 40 lakh from Thakor. Since October 7 last year, Langa has been the subject of investigation in seven cases — of which FIRs have been lodged with the Gujarat Police in five, and two are being investigated by the ED.
