The noose is getting tighter around two influential ministers of the DMK government in Tamil Nadu. Even as the Enforcement Directorate is currently raiding the offices and personal premises of state education minister K Ponmudi, who also faced a marathon interrogation this week, in connection with a 12-year-old mining case, troubles are mounting for another powerful minister, V Senthil Balaji, who was arrested by the agency last month in an alleged cash-for-jobs scam.
Apart from that, the ED has stumbled upon three more scams connected to Balaji’s departments. The solar plant, transformer, and windmill scams are of different natures and are currently under probe, News18 has learnt.
Seeking relief from SC
A petition by Balaji’s wife Megala, challenging his arrest by the ED and the Madras High Court court order upholding the arrest was heard on Friday by a division bench of the Supreme Court and the next hearing would be on July 26.
While the case is pending before the SC, the Enforcement Directorate has found multiple incriminating documents, details of proceeds, and a money trail going to offshore accounts and companies, said a source in the agency. There are at least 16 more cases against Balaji, which the investigators are now probing, the source added.
“We have got some of his account statements and financials. Some old documents that we have seized from his office are leading to more departmental irregularities. There are at least four more scams in which he seemed to have active involvement,” said a senior officer of the ED.
Benami properties
Apart from departmental irregularities, ED officers said that Balaji and his family members own multiple Benami properties and shell companies through which he laundered money.
Of the Benami land cases, the most prominent one is of Balaji’s brother Ashok Kumar allegedly getting a plot worth Rs 40 crore (current valuation) from his mother-in-law as a gift to his wife and him. The four-acre prime land in the central city was sold by an individual for Rs 10.88 lakh to his mother-in-law in 2022, officials say. The land had a ‘Vastu’ problem because of which the individual sold it, the ED was told while probing.
The stamp duty for the land came to around Rs 10 to 12 crore which was evaded and Balaji’s family started construction on it, said a source in the ED. The money trail for buying this land also raised suspicion, as the buyer, the mother-in-law of Ashok Kumar, did not file income tax returns ever and her claims to have the cash turned out to be false during the course of the investigation, added the source.
With the cash-for-jobs scam, the cases related to Benami properties, and the other financial irregularities in tendering processes in Balaji’s departments have also been linked with the primary case, said a senior ED officer, adding that they are now under investigation.
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