india

Updated: May 17, 2019 15:35 IST

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has provisionally attached the property of former chief minister of Haryana Om Prakash Chautala worth nearly Rs 2 crore on charges of laundering money.

The property consists of land and a farmhouse located in New Delhi worth Rs 1,94,52,347, officials said, and was attached under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.

Chautala, who is currently serving a jail term in teachers’ recruitment scam, is being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and ED for disproportionate assets worth Rs 6.09 crore.

The case was initiated on the basis of an FIR registered by CBI against 84-year-old Om Prakash Chautala and others for acquiring assets disproportionate to their known source of income.

CBI has filed a charge sheet against Om Prakash Chautala and his sons Abhay Chautala and Ajay Chautala under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.

CBI found during the course of the investigation under PMLA that Om Prakash Chautala had acquired properties in New Delhi and Panchkula and also constructed a house in Harayana’s Sirsa from the money received from undisclosed sources.

Om Prakash Chautala, the agency said, was directly involved in acquiring and projecting various tainted properties as his untainted properties. He had disclosed such properties in the affidavit filed before returning officer in Haryana state polls in 2005 and 2009 and projecting publicly the tainted properties as untainted.

ED, the central agency mandated to probe financial crimes, had earlier attached properties of Om Prakash Chautala worth Rs 46,96,000, which got confirmed by the adjudicating authority under PMLA. Before that, properties worth Rs 3.68 crore were also attached in April this year.

With the latest action, ED has attached the former chief minister’s property amounting to approximately Rs 6 crore.

Further investigation is under progress.