Jaipur : The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has begun searches at over two dozen locations including the premises of several VIPs including a senior bureaucrat in election-bound Rajasthan in connection with the money laundering allegations against Jal Jivan Mission, sources said. The raids were begun in Jaipur and other places.
The Central agency is conducting raids at the premises of ACS in the PHE department, Dausa, under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), the official sources said. The ongoing searches were in continuation of the raids made by the agency in September.
Rajasthan is in the thick of elections and the State will vote for its 200-member Assembly on November 25. Counting of votes will take place on December 3 along with four other states which are Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Mizoram, and Telangana.
The probe triggered heated political exchanges between the ruling Congress in the State and the leaders of ruling BJP at the Centre. The money laundering case stems from a Rajasthan anti-corruption bureau (ACB) FIR which alleged that Padamchand Jain, proprietor of Shree Shyam Tubewell Company, Mahesh Mittal, proprietor of Shree Ganpati Tubewell Company and others were involved in "giving bribes" to public servants in order to obtain illegal protection, obtaining tenders, getting bills sanctioned and covering up irregularities in respect of work executed by them in respect of various tenders received by them from the public health and engineering department (PHED).