The Enforcement Directorate has attached three immovable properties valued at Rs 24.95 crore belonging to Hero MotoCorp Ltd executive chairman Pawan Kant Munjal as part of an investigation into money laundering, the government agency informed on Friday, 10 November.
According to the ED, the entire value of the seizures and attachments is currently estimated to be around Rs 50 crore.
A complaint alleging criminal conspiracy, cheating, forgery, and account falsification by some Hero MotoCorp officials led to the filing of a First Information Report (FIR) in October.
The Hero MotoCorp executives Hari Gupta and Vikram Kasbekar were mentioned in the FIR along with Pawan Munjal.
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"The prosecution complaint alleges that foreign currency/foreign exchange equivalent to Rs 54 crore was illegally taken out of India," the ED said.
The company clarified in a statement on the exchanges that the case is old and dates back to 2009–2010. The accused were conspiring to commit “the illegal acts of forgery, cheating and falsifying the books...and manufacturing fake month-wise bills” by Brains Logistics, a former vendor of Hero Honda Company. The complaint claimed that these bills, which came to a total of Rs 5.95 crore for 2009 and 2010, were charged to them.
Separately, as part of an investigation into an alleged money laundering case, the ED had searched Munjal and a few other people in August of this year.
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The residential and commercial properties of Munjal in Delhi and Gurgaon, as well as a few connected organisations, were searched.
The ED's case was initiated based on a complaint filed against Munjal by the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI), which is the investigation branch of the Central Board of Indirect Taxes and Customs (CBIC).
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