Harak Singh Rawat, former minister of Uttarakhand government.
Dehradun: Congress leader and former Uttarakhand minister Harak Singh Rawat and his daughter-in-law have been summoned by ED for questioning in connection with a money laundering case. Giving information about this on Friday, official sources said that Rawat has been asked to record his statement before the federal agency in Dehradun on February 29 and his daughter-in-law Anukriti on March 7. The agency had searched the premises of Rawat and others on February 7. It had seized Indian and foreign currency, gold and a large number of documents worth approximately Rs 1.20 crore during the search.
Rawat left BJP and joined Congress in 2022
An official statement issued by the agency a day after the search did not specify what was recovered. ED is investigating against Rawat’s close aide Birendra Singh Kandari, Indian Forest Service officer and former divisional forest officer (DFO) Kishan Chand and former forest range officer Brij Bihari Sharma. Rawat, 63, is a former forest minister of the state and had left BJP and joined Congress ahead of the 2022 Uttarakhand assembly elections. According to the ED, the investigation against these people has arisen from two separate FIRs filed in the state.
The court had canceled the land deed
Uttarakhand Police had registered an FIR against Kandari and others. The agency alleges that Kandari and a person named Narendra Kumar Walia conspired with Rawat and registered two ‘powers of attorney’ of a plot, for which a court had canceled the deed. The second FIR was registered by the state government’s vigilance department against Sharma, Kishan Chand and others under the Indian Penal Code, Forest Conservation Act, Wild Life (Protection) Act and Prevention of Corruption Act.
163 trees were to be cut, more than 6 thousand were cut
The ED claimed that the then Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Kishan Chand and the then ‘Forest Ranger’ Sharma entered into a criminal conspiracy with other officials and Rawat and published the tender for an amount exceeding the authorized financial powers. This tender was also not in accordance with the rules/guidelines of the state government. He is also accused of illegal felling of more than 6,000 trees, while only 163 trees were allowed to be cut, the ED said.
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