Cough syrup racket: ED raids in four UP districts, Ahmedabad, Ranchi

The raids were held at 25 premises belonging to the syndicate’s alleged kingins Vibhor Rana, his brother Vishal Rana, Shubham Jaiswal and their associates who have been booked in criminal cases by the Uttar Pradesh Police and the Food Supply & Drug Administration (FSDA) in 31 districts of the state in the last two months.

The palatial house in Ahmamau near the Lucknow-Sultanpur highway, where Alok Pratap Singh lived with his family. (Express Photo)

Those under the agency’s radar are accused of money laundering through shell companies, and investing in assets like properties, jewellery, high-end vehicles and accessories etc to hide the illicitly earned money.

The properties where the searches were conducted included Vibhor and Vishal Rana’s mansions and the premises of their firm, BN Pharmaceuticals, in Shastri Nagar locality of Saharanpur, and Shubham Jaiswal’s house in Varanasi.

The premises of Jaiswal’s Ranchi-based firm Saili Traders in Hatia’s Tapodana Industrial Area were also searched.

Sources in the agency said their team scanned the documents of 189 bogus firms at Saili Traders’ Ranchi office. Inquiry so far has revealed these bogus firms were created for routing illegal transactions to the tune of Rs 450 crore generated through the illicit sale and diversion of cough syrup and medicines, they claimed.

The team which searched Jaiswal’s house in Varanasi found expensive designer bags of Prada and Gucci, and luxury Rado and Audemars Piguet watches valued at over Rs 1.5 crore. The house was opened for search after it was found locked, the officials said.

They are also looking into the expenses incurred on the luxury interior work done in the house.

The ED officials, however, were in for the biggest surprise when they found the palatial house of Alok Singh, a dismissed UP Police constable, in Lucknow’s newly developed locality of Sultanpur Road. Singh, one of the accused in the illegal syrup trade, has been lodged in a jail in Lucknow since his arrest on December 2.

The agency engaged a government-approved property valuer to assess the exact cost of purchase and construction of the house and the money spent on the interior work. A preliminary inquiry suggested the construction cost alone could have been around Rs 5 crore, excluding the land value, it is learnt.

In Ahmedabad, the agency searched the premises of Aarpik Pharmaceuticals Private Ltd run by Manohar Jaiswal, an alleged associate of Shubham Jaiswal, for his purported involvement in the illegal trade, the officials said. Unaccounted transactions amounting to several crores of rupees between Aarpik Pharmaceuticals and its sister concern Idhika Life Sciences were detected in the preliminary inquiry, they added.

Also, the initial inquiry found that huge sums were spent on the construction of the luxury house of Vibhor and Vishal Rana in Saharanpur and the subsequent expenditure on the interior work.

The agency also searched the house and offices of Amit Singh Tata, another jailed accused, in Jaunpur, and seized documents related to his assets. A detailed investigation is underway to connect the trade links of the key accused, the officials said.

The UP Police and the FSDA have lodged 52 cases against 133 firms in 31 districts in the matter. Nearly two dozen accused have been arrested so far for their alleged involvement in the cough syrup racket.