Nagpur, February 26 (NationPress) - The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has provisionally attached properties in Nagpur valued at Rs 3.35 crore belonging to a couple accused of deceiving two investors with false promises of property sales and arranging loans from an overseas institution, as stated by an official on Thursday.

The seized assets comprise three commercial shops and two plots of land covering a total area of 10.37 acres, owned by Sachin Shatrugha Pandey and his family members, according to the ED's Nagpur Sub-Zonal Office.

These properties were provisionally attached under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.

The investigation was initiated following FIRs lodged at the Dhantoli and Sitaburdi Police Stations in Nagpur, citing various sections of the IPC, 1860, against Pandey and his accomplices engaged in criminal conduct, the statement revealed.

The inquiry confirmed that despite no longer owning the two properties in Nagpur, the accused, Pandey and his wife Khushi, entered into a sales agreement with complainant Amit Kothari for the properties at Rs 2.5 crore, receiving Rs 2.2 crore in cash.

Subsequently, they failed to execute the deed transferring ownership to the complainant and later signed a cancellation agreement, promising to refund the amount by March 31, 2013, as noted by the ED.

However, the couple did not comply with the agreement's terms, failing to return the Rs 2.2 crore and misappropriating the funds for personal use, resulting in wrongful loss to the complainant, the central agency detailed.

In another case, the investigation revealed that Pandey and his associates deceived Chandraprakash Wadhwani, claiming they would secure a Rs 18 crore loan from a foreign institution without collateral through a Standby Letter of Credit (SBLC) via his company Luft International, and unlawfully took Rs 1.2 crore in cash for margin money.

They neither provided the promised loan nor returned the cash taken as margin, misappropriating the Rs 1.2 crore for their own benefit, the ED added.

The investigation conducted under PMLA, 2002, has established that Pandey is a repeat offender who has cheated not only the current complainants but numerous other innocent individuals through various false promises, the ED stated.

The probe further indicated that the funds acquired by Pandey and his associates were partly laundered through multiple bank accounts held in their names, as well as those of family members and business entities.

From these accounts, approximately Rs 90 lakh was diverted to purchase residential flats from the Pioneer Group, Rs 20 lakh was transferred to his associate Swarnim Jaykumar Dixit for further use, and over Rs 70 lakh was spent on personal expenses, the agency reported.

Additionally, the investigation found that the remaining cash was partially allocated for medical treatments of his wife Khushi both within India and abroad and partly used to acquire another property, as per the ED's findings.