ED attaches Rs 205-cr assets of ex-Tamilnad Mercantile Bank chairman, others

The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) has provisionally attached assets worth Rs 205.36 crore of MGM Maran and MGM Anand and their company -- Southern Agrifurane Industries -- under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002.

MGM Maran was the chairman of Tamilnad Mercantile Bank (TMBL) in 2007 when he along with other directors and officials of the bank had facilitated a deal of sale of 23.60 per cent shares of TMBL from Indian shareholders to unauthorised overseas persons.

The agency said in the statement released on late Monday that it was also found MGM Maran acquired undisclosed foreign investments of Rs 293.91 crore directly outside India during the same period. Such undisclosed investments were without the approval of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) as well as from unexplained and highly dubious sources.

In order to escape the reach of Indian laws, the agency said MGM Maran surrendered his Indian citizenship and obtained Cyprus' citizenship. Not only that, it was also found that Maran also started transferring his wealth from India to overseas in order to keep the same out of reach of the Indian Law Enforcement Agencies in the garb of Overseas Direct Investments from the Indian company -- Southern Agrifurane Industries. On the complaint of AD Bank and Axis Bank, the Central Crime Branch, Chennai (CCB), registered FIR and accordingly ED recorded an enforcement case information report (ECIR).

The company filed a writ petition against ED proceedings before Madras High Court in October 2022 and obtained an interim stay on ED proceedings by making misrepresentation before the Court. ED in its detailed counter affidavit explained the entire background and facts of the case, according to the agency.

Accordingly, the Madras High Court through a landmark judgement dated December 19, 2022, dismissed the writ petition and upheld that the company by making a false declaration has induced the AD Bank to deliver valuable foreign exchange and such remittance in the hands of the wholly-owned subsidiaries of the company, situated outside India, would constitute proceeds of crime.

Meanwhile, ED has now provisionally attached proceeds of crime under PMLA as the equivalent value in the form of the entire shareholding of both Maran and Anand in all prominent MGM Group of companies in India, lands and buildings in Southern Agrifurane Industries as well as entire shareholding (3.31 per cent) of Maran in TMBL (recently listed on BSE). Further investigation was under progress, the agency said.

( With inputs from ANI )

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