The court said the offences they were charged with don't fall in the schedule of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and hence there cannot be any “proceeds of crime” as defined by the Act.
“We had shared information with the state of Chhattisgarh on July 11, but no action was taken. Hence, we had to approach the High Court, seeking a CBI probe in the matter,” Saurabh Pandey, ED counsel, said.
According to the agency, the alleged corruption began in 2019 and continued until 2022 in the Excise department. It alleged that the syndicate was led by Dhebar and a retired IAS officer who has not named yet as accused.
According to the ED, in the alleged liquor scam, that ran between 2019 and 2022, the accused government officials allegedly collected bribes from the distillers.