Sand mafia: 78 accused in 10,000 page police charge sheet
On the basis of this investigation report, the Revenue Department has recovered a fine of about Rs.5 crores from the racketeers.
Nagpur: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the city’s crime branch is all set with a 10,000-page charge sheet against around 78 accused after the biggest-ever crackdown on the sand mafia in the state. In this entire investigation, the racketeers have also been accused of defrauding the Maharashtra government of crores of rupees.
On the basis of this investigation report, the Revenue Department has recovered a fine of about Rs.5 crores from the racketeers. About 100 vehicles have also been identified and many of them were seized for carrying stolen sand. The sources said that the Special Investigation Team report about substantial transactions of unaccounted cash in various accounts had also been sent to the Enforcement Directorate.
During this entire investigation, the city police also unearthed a scam involving irregular Electronic Transit Passes (ETPs) that were issued to racketeers based in Narsinghpur and Seoni and were used by the sand mafia located in Nagpur district. During this investigation, the Special Investigation Team of the city police identified 458 such ETPs and seized stolen sand worth Rs 1.50 crore.
The evidence forwarded to the ED included specific examples of money laundering in multiple fake and genuine accounts of sand mafia racketeers like Guddu Khorgade and Narendra Pimple. This was done to avoid government taxes and surcharges. The report sent to the ED also contained names of some high-profile politicians and misuse of power by revenue officials, sources said.
CP Amitesh Kumar, under whose leadership the Special Investigation Team and DCP M Sudarshan prepared the charge sheet, He also said that a financial and legal audit had been done to strengthen the evidence. “A comprehensive charge sheet has been prepared against sand ghat owners, transporters, agents, middlemen, leaseholders and those pretending to be their carriers,” the CP said. He said that the case revealed that the sand mafia was using fake ETPs to cheat the entire system of ground-level investigation. The case was investigated by Assistant PI Mayur Chaurasia.
Apart from these fake ETP cases, the city police have also registered three other cases against the sand mafia. And tell that last year a case was registered against two people who sold the stolen sand to MOIL in Ambajhari police station. A case of extortion was also registered against Pimple at the Koradi police station. When he had demanded money from the co-accused by promising to bribe the police and judiciary to settle their cases. And another case has also been registered against Khorgade and his wife in Sadar police station for selling stolen sand.
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