Overview
- The Enforcement Directorate searched nine premises in Kolkata, Burdwan and Habra on Saturday in a PMLA case over alleged diversion of subsidised ration wheat.
- Investigators covered sites tied to suppliers, exporters and rice traders including Niranjan Chandra Saha, Sagar Saha, Partha Saha and Samir Chandra Kumar.
- The money-laundering case flows from an October 23, 2020 FIR at Basirhat based on a Ghojadanga customs complaint over large-scale diversion of Public Distribution System grain.
- ED accounts detail wheat bought through unauthorised channels, gunny bags with Food Corporation of India markings reversed to hide origin, and earlier seizures of about 5,101.25 tonnes in roughly 175 trucks.
- The timing days before the April 29 vote has drawn criticism from the Trinamool Congress, while the agency says it is acting on investigation leads and notes prior arrests including former food minister Jyotipriya Mallick, who later received bail.