Money laundering case: Look out notices for 3 key accused

The Andhra Pradesh CID, probing the Rs 680 crore money laundering case in Visakhapatnam, has issued look out notices to all airports and seaports for the three main accused in the racket.
The Interpol is also being approached for issuing a red corner notice against the trio, all businessmen, a top police official said today.
The case was registered last week.
"We have secured the passports of the three accused - Ayush Goyal alias Shiny, Vineet Goenka alias Chintu and Vikas Gupta.
"As of now they are the main accused in the case and we are approaching the Interpol for a red corner notice to trace and nab them," Director General of Police (in-charge) N Sambasiva Rao said.

Shiny and Chintu belong to Kolkata, while Gupta hails from New Delhi.

Addressing a press conference here this evening, the acting DGP said the Enforcement Directorate was also being requested to take up investigation into the case as it has the power to attach properties of the accused.
Moreover, most of the money had been funnelled to China, Singapore and Hong Kong, Rao said.
"It's actually a money laundering and not a hawala case (an illegal method of remittance across countries) as being referred. The money transactions happened using several shell companies.
"Initially, we registered an FIR against nine persons as accused, however, during the investigation, we included eight more persons -- directors of various shell companies -- as the accused. We have so far arrested six persons," he said.

The role of banks was also being keenly probed as a whopping Rs 533 crore was sent out through just one bank (Canara), he added.
As per the FIR, Rs 680 crore came into the country from abroad of which Rs 569 crore was again sent back mainly to three countries.
Vaddi Mahesh, named as accused No 1 in the FIR, told the police that he was merely a "broker" who was paid 85 paisa per dollar in the transactions, the acting DGP said.
"We have to secure Mahesh's police custody for further interrogation," he said.
Asked if any political leader was involved in the money laundering racket, Rao said there was "no evidence" so far about the role of anyone other than the 17 accused.

"We have so far no evidence against others. But the number of accused may increase to 30 or 40 after further investigations. The CID is doing a good job," he remarked.