ED summons ex-U'khand minister Harak Singh Rawat for questioning on Feb 29

The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) has summoned former Uttarakhand minister and Congress leader Harak Singh Rawat and others in connection with a money laundering investigation.

The ED has asked the Congress leader to appear at the agency's office for questioning on February 29.

Rawat, 63, is a former forest minister of the state and had joined the Congress ahead of the 2022 Uttarakhand assembly polls.

Notably, the ED had conducted raids across Uttarakhand, Haryana, and Delhi, including Rawat's residence, on February 7 in the alleged forest scam case.

During his tenure as the state forest minister, Rawat and some of his departmental officers were allegedly involved in illegal tree cutting and construction in the Pakhro range of Corbett Park under the Tiger Safari Project.

The Forest Survey of India (FSI) claimed in its report that more than 6,000 trees were illegally cut in the Corbett Tiger Reserve (CTR) against the permission of 163 for the Pakhru Tiger Safari. However, the state forest department refuted the FSI's claims and said that some technical issues needed to be resolved before finally accepting the report.

Earlier, the Uttarakhand Vigilance Team had also raided an institute in Dehradun's Shankarpur and a petrol pump in Chhiddarwala linked to Rawat.