New Delhi. The ED has conducted raids in four cities of Gujarat and Maharashtra in connection with the Rs 2,800 crore money laundering case linked to Paplaj Foreign Trade LLP. The Surat unit of the ED carried out searches at various locations in Surat, Vadodara, Mumbai and Pune at the premises of Paplaj Foreign Trade LLP, its partners Somabhai Sundarbhai Meena and Ojaskumar Mohanlal Naik and their associates under the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA), 1999.

ED started investigation on the information

The agency said that during the search operation, incriminating documents and electronic devices were recovered and seized. The ED initiated the investigation based on information that Paplaj Foreign Trade LLP had remitted huge sums of money on account of overvaluation in connection with import and export of diamonds. The investigation revealed that Paplaj Foreign Trade LLP had overvalued the import of diamonds and remitted an amount of Rs 2,800 crore between July, 2023 and March, 2024.

Many revelations were made in the ED investigation

The ED probe also revealed that Paplaj Foreign Trade LLP received an amount of Rs 2,800 crore from entities based in Surat, Delhi, Mumbai and Pune and sent it to eight entities based in Hong Kong. During the searches, it was revealed that the entities which transferred an amount of about Rs 2,800 crore to Paplaj Foreign Trade LLP were fake entities, the ED said.