Mumbai: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Monday night arrested Chhagan Bhujbal, a former deputy chief minister of Maharashtra and senior leader of the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), in connection with an investigation into government contracts he awarded as public works department minister during the previous Congress-NCP regime in Maharashtra.

ED officials questioned Bhujbal for close to two hours on Monday morning. Bhujbal’s nephew, former MP Samir Bhujbal, is already under arrest by ED.

A senior Maharashtra bureaucrat confirmed the arrest. “Bhujbal would be produced in court tomorrow and we will press for a 14-day custody," said an ED official investigating the case on the condition of anonymity.

Maharashtra’s Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) in 2014 launched an investigation into the decision to award the government contract to construct Maharashtra Sadan in New Delhi and other public contracts in Maharashtra. The ACB in its report found serious irregularities including alleged money laundering. The ACB alleged that a chain of front companies had been set up by the Bhujbals and their associates to route kickbacks that they received for awarding the Maharashtra Sadan contract to a favoured party.

The ACB report also accused the Bhujbals of amassing wealth disproportionate to their known sources of income. In June 2015 the ACB raided a few Bhujbal properties and in mid-2015 the Maharashtra government handed over the probe to the ED after the ACB probe alleged instances of money laundering.

The ED raided as many as 11 Bhujbal properties including their homes in Nashik and Mumbai. The ED also raided the offices of the Bandra-based Maharashtra Education Trust that has been set up by Bhujbal. In February, the ED also summoned Bhujbal’s son Pankaj for interrogation.

Soon after Bhujbal’s nephew was arrested, NCP president Sharad Pawar had defended the former Maharashtra deputy chief minister saying the Bharatiya Janata Party-led government in state was carrying out a political witchhunt against its rivals.

The Maharashtra ACB is also investigating alleged corruption cases involving irrigation contracts awarded by senior NCP leaders and former ministers Ajit Pawar and Sunil Tatkare.

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