IAS Pooja Singhal sent to ED custody in money laundering case 

Jharkhand mining secretary Pooja Singhal was arrested on Wednesday night by the Enforcement Directorate in a money laundering case pertaining to embezzlement of funds worth crores in the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA) in Khunti and other suspicious transactions.

She was taken into custody under the criminal sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) after two days of questioning by the central agency. Singhal was not the only one to be arrested in this case as the central agency also nabbed Suman Kumar, a chartered accountant and financial advisor linked to the IAS officer and her husband on May 7.

The agency recovered over Rs 17 crore cash from Kumar’s premises during the raids on May 6. Total cash seizure across locations is Rs 19.31 crore, as per officials. As per the agency, the IAS officer purportedly transferred Rs 16.57 crore from her “personal account” to those controlled or owned by CA Kumar.

IAS officer purchased 13 policies and paid a premium worth Rs 80.81 lakh between 2005-06 and 2012-13 fiscal and later “closed them (policies) pre-maturely and received closure amount of Rs 84.64 lakh.” Agency is also looking at business transactions and other finances of a multi-speciality hospital in Ranchi, allegedly managed by Singhal’s husband.

Officials also claimed they seized “incriminating documents that indicate political and higher bureaucracy links with alleged illegal mining activities in the states” during the raids.

The ED case against Singhal and her accomplices pertains to a money laundering case against former junior engineer in the Jharkhand government Ram Binod Prasad Sinha was arrested in June 2020 from West Bengal after the agency booked him under PMLA in 2012. Sinha was accused of defrauding public money and investing it in his name as well as his family members between April 2008-March 21, 2011.

Sinha told agencies that he paid five per cent commission out of the defrauded funds, which were earmarked for executing MGNREGA projects, to the district administration. ED also alleged that charges of irregularities were made against Singhal when she was the deputy commissioner/district magistrate of Chatra, Khunti and Palamu from 2007-13.

ED claimed in its remand note presented to the court that Singhal and her husband received “huge” cash deposits – to the tune of Rs 1.43 crore—over and above her salary in their accounts during the period she was posted as DM of various districts in the state.

(With agency inputs)