The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday claimed that former Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra not only renovated a prime property in London, which is under investigation in the agency’s probe against fugitive arms dealer Sanjay Bhandari, but also stayed in it.
The agency also said Vadra and his alleged aide CC Thampi, a UAE-based businessman who was arrested in January 2020, purchased huge chunks of land in Faridabad and had financial transactions with each other.
The agency made the claims after filing a charge sheet against Thampi, an NRI businessman, and a British citizen, Sumit Chadha, who is said to be the brother-in-law of Bhandari, last week. A Delhi court took cognisance of the charge sheet on Tuesday and issued non-bailable warrants against Chadha.
To be sure, Vadra has not been named as an accused in the charge sheet.
ED has repeatedly claimed since 2020 that the property in question, 12 Ellorton House, Bryanston Square in London worth 1.9 million pounds belongs to Vadra whereas Thampi, Dubai-based controller of Sky Lite Investments FZE and owner of Holiday Group, played a crucial role in its purchase.
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“…Investigation revealed that Sanjay Bhandari held various undisclosed foreign income and assets including following properties at no. 12 Bryanston Square, London and 6 Grosvenor Hill Court, London. These assets are proceeds of crime as per the provisions of PMLA, 2002. CC Thampi and Sumit Chadha have been found to be involved in the concealment and use of these proceeds of crime,” ED said in a statement on Tuesday.
On Vadra, the agency said, “Investigation further revealed that Thampi is a close associate of Robert Vadra”.
“Vadra not only renovated the aforesaid property at 12 Bryanston Square, London through Sumit Chadha but also stayed in the same. Further, Vadra as well as Thampi purchased huge chunk of land at Faridabad and had financial transactions with each other,” the ED statement added.
Bhandari, according to ED, had created a web of entities by engaging various individuals based in the UAE and the UK for the purpose of acquiring several properties outside India.
One such entity was Sky Lite Investment FZE, floated in Hamriyah Free Zone, Sharjah, UAE. The name of this company was later changed to Mayfair Investment FZE, with accused Thampi as its sole shareholder, ED has said.
“Property described as 12 Bryanston Square, London, was transferred to Sky Lite Investment FZE after extensive renovation and without any additional cost,” the ED has said in its court documents. It is suspected that this property at Bryanston Sqaure was acquired through pay-offs in a petroleum deal during the UPA government in 2009.
ED has said that Bhandari, who fled to the UK via Nepal in December 2016 after the NDA government booked him under the Officials Secrets Act, along with Thampi and Vadra had devised a scheme of money-laundering by way of transferring the proceeds of crime multiple times from one individual to another.
HT reached out to Robert Vadra for a comment on the ED claims but there was no response till the time of going to press. In January 2020, he told HT: “It’s a free for all in this country…truth has no place. Witch-hunt continues for almost a decade. Another decade more and we will be referring to what happened in 2010, 2011, 2012 and on and on.”
Bhandari, 61, is under investigation by multiple agencies, including ED, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), the Income Tax department and the Delhi Police, for money-laundering, violation of foreign exchange as well as black money laws, and the Official Secrets Act for having access to sensitive defence documents.
The Indian government sent two extradition requests against the fugitive businessman which were certified by the then UK home secretary Priti Patel in June 2020, after which British authorities arrested him on July 15, 2020. The court, however, released him on bail pending extradition proceedings.
A Westminster Court ordered his extradition to India in November 2022, but he has challenged it in the high court there.
The arms dealer is also under investigation since 2019 by the CBI on charges of corruption in a ₹2,985-crore deal in 2009 to procure 75 PC-7 trainer aircraft from Swiss plane maker Pilatus Aircraft.
