ED assistant director arrested for accepting bribe of Rs 20 lakh from Mumbai jeweller

“Taking immediate cognizance of this incident and following the policy of zero tolerance towards corruption, ED has initiated criminal action against Sandeep Singh under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA),” the ED officials said.

According to the CBI officials, the complainant identified as Vipul Thakkar, owner of M/s V S Gold, had submitted a written complaint against Singh. Singh is an officer from the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) and was posted as the assistant director at Investigation Unit-1 at the ED headquarters in New Delhi.

The officials added that the ED is investigating a case of money laundering against Thakkar’s jewellery firm which was initiated on the basis of multiple cases registered by the local police in Delhi, Uttarakhand and Bangalore.

During the course of the investigation, ED had conducted searches at Thakkar’s residential premises on August 4 where Singh was acting as the search warrant authorised officer.

“The search was uneventful and conducted as per the due procedure,” the ED officials said.

An officer further said, “Singh was not the investigating officer in the case and he was just requisitioned for the limited purpose of conducting the search at the target premises.”

The FIR registered by the CBI on Wednesday read “the verification of complaint in the presence of independent witnesses, prima facie revealed that a criminal conspiracy was hatched by Singh and unknown others to obtain undue advantage from the complainant of Rs 20 lakh for not arresting his son Nihar Thakkar in the matter being investigated by ED.”

Singh has been booked under section 61 (2) (a) BNS, 2023 and section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.

“He had initially demanded Rs 25 lakh but after negotiation he agreed to Rs 20 lakh. Since then, Singh kept changing locations of accepting money between Delhi and Mumbai; however at around 11pm on Wednesday, he was caught red handed while accepting the bribe,” said an officer.

Both CBI and ED conducted searches at his residence and office on August 8.
“Search operation was conducted at his residence on August 8 under the provisions of PMLA by ED so as to gather evidence of his criminal activities. His office was jointly searched by CBI and ED to collect evidence related to the offence,” ED officials said.