Enforcement Directorate (ED), Mumbai Zonal Office has provisionally attached immovable and movable properties worth ₹97.79 Crore belonging to Ripu Sudan Kundra aka Raj Kundra under the provisions of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002. The attached properties include a Residential flat situated in Juhu presently in the name of Shilpa Shetty, Residential Bungalow situated in Pune and Equity shares in the name of Raj Kundra.

ED initiated investigation based on multiple FIRs registered by Maharashtra Police and Delhi Police against M/s Variable Tech Pte Ltd, Late Amit Bhardwaj, Ajay Bhardwaj, Vivek Bhardwaj, Simpy Bhardwaj, Mahender Bhardwaj and number of MLM agents, wherein it has been alleged that they had collected huge amounts of funds in the form of Bitcoins (worth ₹6,600 crore in 2017 itself) from the gullible public with the false promises of 10% per month return in the form of Bitcoins.

The collected Bitcoins were supposed to be utilized for Bitcoin mining and investors were supposed to get huge returns in Crypto assets. However the promoters cheated the investors and have been concealing the ill-gotten Bitcoins in obscure online wallets. ED investigation revealed that Raj Kundra received 285 Bitcoins from the mastermind. The said Bitcoins were sourced out of proceeds of crime collected by Amit Bhardwaj from gullible investors.

Since the deal didn't materialize, Kundra is still in possession of 285 Bitcoins which are presently valued at more than ₹150 Crore. Earlier, the ED conducted multiple search operations resulting in the arrest of three individuals, namely Simpy Bhardwaj on December 17, 2023, Nitin Gaur on December 29, 2023, and Nikhil Mahajan on January 16, 2023. All of them are presently in judicial custody as of the date.

The main accused, Ajay Bhardwaj and Mahendra Bhardwaj, are still absconding. Earlier, the ED had attached properties worth ₹69 Crore. The Prosecution Complaint in this case was filed in 2019, and a Supplementary Prosecution Complaint was filed recently in February 2024.

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This story originally appeared in the Free Press Journal and is published here under a mutual content-sharing agreement.