ED attaches assets worth ₹1,452 cr in probe against RCOM, group firms

The attached assets include buildings in Dhirubhai Ambani Knowledge City (DAKC) and Millenium Business Park in Navi Mumbai as well as plots and buildings in Pune, Chennai and Bhubaneswar, officials said

Mumbai: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has provisionally attached assets worth ₹1,452.51 crore as part of its money laundering probe into alleged cases of bank fraud involving Reliance Communications Ltd (RCOM), Reliance Commercial Finance Ltd and Reliance Home Finance Ltd, officials familiar with the matter said.

ED attaches assets worth ₹1,452 cr in probe against RCOM, group firms

The attached assets include buildings in Dhirubhai Ambani Knowledge City (DAKC) and Millenium Business Park in Navi Mumbai as well as plots and buildings in Pune, Chennai and Bhubaneswar, the officials said.

The ED had earlier attached properties worth over ₹7,545 crore in connection with the probe. With the latest attachments, the cumulative value of attached assets has shot up to ₹8,997 crore, officials said.

The ED’s investigation is based on a case registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against RCOM, industrialist Anil Ambani and others under various sections of the Indian Penal Code and the Prevention of Corruption Act. RCOM, which was earlier part of the Anil Ambani-led Reliance Group, and other group companies allegedly availed loans from domestic and foreign lenders in 2010-2012, and onwards, of which ₹40,185 crore is outstanding, while nine banks have so far declared loan accounts of the group as fraud, officials said.

According to the ED, loans taken by one group company from certain banks were used to repay loans taken by other group companies from other banks, and such funds were transferred to related parties or invested in mutual funds, which was in contravention of the terms and conditions of loan sanction letters.

“In particular, RCOM and its group companies diverted over ₹13,600 crore for evergreening of loans; over ₹12,600 crore was diverted to connected parties and over ₹1,800 crore was invested in fixed deposits, mutual funds, among others, which were substantially liquidated for re-routing to group entities,” an ED official said. “Huge misuse of bill-discounting for the purpose of funneling funds to connected parties has also been detected by ED.”

The ED suspects that certain loans were also allegedly siphoned off outside India through foreign outward remittances.

“The ED is actively pursuing perpetrators of these financial crimes and is committed to restituting the proceeds of crime to their rightful claimants,” the official said.

Responding to the ED’s latest attachments, a Reliance Group spokesperson told HT, “Reliance Group would like to clarify that as per ED’s own media release, the attached assets belong to Reliance Communications (RCOM), which has not been a part of the Reliance Group since 2019 – i.e. for the last six years.”

RCOM had been undergoing the corporate insolvency resolution process (CIRP) for over six years and all matters relating to its resolution are currently before the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) and the Supreme Court, the spokesperson said.

“RCOM is presently managed by a resolution professional under the supervision of the NCLT / Committee of Creditors (CoC) and a consortium of banks/ lenders. Anil Ambani is in no way involved with Reliance Communications and has resigned six years ago in 2019,” the spokesperson said.

The attachment order would have no material impact on the operations, performance, or future prospects of Reliance Infrastructure and Reliance Power, the spokesperson clarified.