Former Fortis promoter Malvinder Singh arrested in money laundering case

Former Fortis Healthcare promoter Malvinder Singh and ex-CMD of Religare Enterprises Ltd (REL) Sunil Godhwani were arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case on Thursday.

Both were taken into custody inside the Tihar central jail where they are lodged in judicial custody in a case being probed by Economic Offence Wing (EOW) of the Delhi Police.

The case pertains to the alleged misappropriation of funds of RFL.

They were produced before a court seeking production warrant against the accused to quiz them in the custody.

ED counsel Nitesh Rana informed the court about the development and sought their custodial interrogation.

The court, however, directed that both the accused persons be produced before a metropolitan magistrate in the central jail itself owing to the strike in the district courts of Delhi.

"The court is informed that accused Malvinder Mohan Singh and Sunil Godwani are lodged in central jail numbers 8 and 7 respectively at Tihar Jail. Accordingly, the applications filed by the ED be put up before concerned duty MM, Tihar jail tomorrow, i.e., November 15, for disposal in accordance with law," Special Judge Sandeep Yadav said.

Singh and Godwani are accused of laundering money, punishable under sections 3 and 4 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, the agency said.

They were in judicial custody along with Kavi Arora and Anil Saxena in the case.RFL is a group firm of REL, which was promoted earlier by the Singh brothers.

According to the ED, both the accused, along with others, transferred an amount of approximately Rs 1,000 crore to various persons from the entities linked to a corporate loan book and finally, it was siphoned off.

Religare has accused the five persons of diverting funds, claiming that loans were taken by Shivinder while managing the firm but the money was invested in other companies, the ED said.

The ED had started its investigation in the matter on the basis of a case lodged by the Delhi Police.