RAIPUR: The Enforcement Directorate has filed a charge sheet in connection with the Mahadev online betting app case, the agency statement said on Saturday.
According to the officials, 14 accused have been named in the chargesheet, namely Sourabh Chandrakar, Ravi Uppal, Vikas Chhapariya, Chandrabhushan Verma, Satish Chandrakar, Anil Dammani, Sunil Dammani, Vishal Ahuja, Dheeraj Ahuja, Srijan Assiciates through Punaram Verma, Shiv Kumar Verma, Punaram Verma Shiv Kumar Verma, Yashoda Verma and Pawan Nathani.
“ED has filed a charge sheet in the Mahadev app case at PMLA court Raipur on October 20, 2023. 14 accused has been named in the prosecution complaint,” the ED statement said.
The next hearing in the case is posted on November 25, 2023.
The statement further said that no celebrity has been accused in the prosecution complaint.
Notably, this comes a day after Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel lashed out at the Centre questioning whether the government had accepted election funds for not banning the betting application.
Speaking exclusively with ANI in Raipur on Friday, the CM said, “The central government has the authority to put a ban on the betting app, not the state government. My allegation is that if you (referring to the BJP-led government at the centre) are not imposing a ban on the application, so have you accepted the fund for elections.”
The Mahadev Online Book Betting app is an umbrella syndicate arranging online platforms for enabling illegal betting websites to enrol new users, create user IDs, and launder money through a layered web of Benami bank accounts.
The ED in mid-September this year released details of its investigation into the online money laundering case linked with the Mahadev Online Book Betting app. Wedding planners, dancers, decorators etc, were hired from Mumbai and hawala channels were used to make payments in cash, the agency had said.
The agency said Chandrakar and Ravi Uppal who hail from Bhilai in Chhattisgarh are the two main promoters of the Mahadev betting platform and ran their operations from Dubai. They had created an empire for themselves in that country.
The agency had recently conducted searches at 39 locations across Raipur, Bhopal, Mumbai and Kolkata and seized illegal assets worth Rs 417 crore. ED has also earnestly taken up investigation abroad. A Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) special court at Raipur has also issued non-bailable warrants against the suspects.
The ED which is investigating money laundering charges in connection with the Mahadev Online Book app had last month conducted searches in Chhattisgarh and arrested four accused including the chief liaisoner of the betting syndicate, which the probe agency alleged was organizing payment of bribes to senior government functionaries as ‘protection money’.
ED had stated that it has successfully identified other major players involved in the money laundering operations of the app. (ANI)