ED attaches assets worth ₹30-crore in ‘illegal mining’ case

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached 44 immoveable properties worth about ₹30 crore, having agricultural lands of more than 85 acres in connection with an illegal mining syndicate case.

The properties are located in Ludhiana, Roop Nagar, SAS Nagar, Shaheed Bhagat Singh Nagar, and other districts of Punjab, purportedly belonging to Kuldeep Singh Makkar, Angad Singh Makkar, Puneet Singh Makkar, and their business entities.

The ED’s probe is based on a case registered by the Haryana Police alleging illegal mining of sand, boulder-gravel and boulder-gravel-sand in Yamuna Nagar against various mining lease holder companies, including Mubarikpur Royalty Company, Development Strategies (India) Private Limited, Delhi Royalty Company, JSM Foods Private Limited, and PS Buildtech, and also against various screening plants, stone crushers, and associated persons, the agency said on Saturday.

The illegal mining activities in the case are estimated to be over ₹300 crore, of which the share of “Angad Singh Makkar & his family is more than ₹110 crore”, according to the agency.

“The entity, namely Mubarikpur Royalty Company, and associated syndicate members have done mining on unauthorised lands and beyond permissible limits and by generating fake e-Rawanas. The sale proceeds of mined minerals of all the mining entities used to come in cash only. The cash generated from these illegal activities were distributed amongst these members being beneficiaries of the mining entities in an organised manner,” it is alleged.

Earlier, the ED said, it had conducted searches and arrested Dilbag Singh, Kulwinder Singh, Surender Panwar, and Angad Singh Makkar, and provisionally attached assets worth ₹122 crore of Dilbag Singh and his associates, including Angad Singh Makkar, which was later confirmed by the adjudicating authority under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.