NEW DELHI: In yet another case of restitution of assets to victims of a scam, the Enforcement Directorate has allowed the sale and refund of 185 crore worth of attached property of Jammu-based Surya Pharmaceuticals to SBI in a money laundering case against the company and its directors.
The attached assets include a building and superstructure on 80 kanals of land, along with plant and machinery, located in Samba in Jammu.
This is the third case of restitution after disposing of assets of accused in the past few months. Earlier, ED had returned flats in Gurgaon to their owners who were allegedly cheated by real estate developers and refunded money to small investors who became victims of Kolkata’s Rose Valley chit fund ‘scam’.
On Wednesday, ED said, “The directorate’s Chandigarh office has successfully returned properties valued over 185 crore from Surya Pharmaceuticals Ltd to the SBI-led consortium of banks through the official liquidator as part of its ongoing efforts to restore the proceeds of crime to the rightful victims and claimants of the offence of money laundering.”
A special court in Chandigarh on Oct 25 allowed the sale of assets and its restitution to SBI, which had earlier filed a complaint of loan fraud of 829 crore against the accused. The court had also issued non-bailable warrants against directors Rajiv Goyal and Alka Goyal, who had fled the country and were subsequently declared proclaimed offenders in 2017, before ED could initiate its money laundering case.
The restitution comes in record time, within six months of ED filing its charge-sheet against the accused Goyals in April. ED will soon move courts for declaring them as fugitives under the Fugitive Economic Offenders Act to initiate their extradition to India.
The restitution order came after ED held meetings with the lending banks and the official liquidator, appointed by the NCLT, assisting them in filing a restitution application before the special court in Chandigarh.