Mumbai : The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has summoned Shiv Sena MP Bhavana Gawali for questioning in a money laundering case on October 4, official sources said on Wednesday.
The ED has already arrested Saeed Khan, a close aide of Shiv Sena MP Bhavana Gawali, in the ongoing probe against a firm linked with her.
Ms Gawali, five time Shiv Sena, MP, from Yavatmal Washim constituency of Maharashtra and is being investigated by the ED in a money laundering case.
Saeed Khan was the director of the firm named Mahila Utkarsh Pratisthan, along with Bhavana Gawali’s mother Shalinitai Gawali. The firm was incorporated in 2019, and before that it was a trust in which the MP and her mother were members.
ED officials suspect that forgery was committed at the charity commissioner’s office to change the trust into company. The firm is suspected to have been used for fraud and siphoning off of funds.
According to sources, irregularities of around Rs 17 crore have been found in the trust that is linked to the Yavatmal-Washim MP Bhavana A social worker identified as Harish Sarda recently alleged that Bhavana Gawali had duped the National Cooperative Development Corporation (NCDC) through a firm named Balaji Sahkari Particle Board by taking a loan of Rs 43.35 crore. Harish Sarda claimed that Bhavana Gawali borrowed money from NCDC for ten years but the company was never actually started.
Similar irregularities were allegedly found in connection with Bhavana Gawali’s firm Bhavana Agro Products and Services Ltd. For this company, she reportedly borrowed Rs 7.5 crore from two banks. The company was later sold to her private secretary for Rs 7.09 crore, sources added.
