On 6th January, reports emerged suggesting that Congress leader and the former chief minister of Chhattisgarh Bhupesh Baghel has been named in a supplementary chargesheet that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has filed in connection with the money laundering case investigation linked to the alleged illegal gaming and betting through the Mahadev online book application.
The chargesheet is related to the allegations that Bhupesh Baghel had received Rs 508 crores from the promoters of the Mahadev App.
On January 1, the agency filed a new chargesheet in the matter before a special court in Raipur. The PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) special court received the chargesheet. Shubham Soni, Amit Kumar Aggarwal, Rohit Gulati, Bhim Singh Yadav and Asim Das are the five individuals named in the chargesheet.
ED told a court that Asim Das, the arrested accused, has withdrawn his denial and he stands by his testimony. Das had, notably, claimed he had been sent to “deliver” cash to former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister and Congress leader Bhupesh Baghel but later he denied making the statement. Now, once again, he has retracted his denial of having made the charges, saying he stands by the statement.
The agency highlighted that Asim Das confirmed in his statement that he received instructions from Subham Soni, a well-known person in Mahadev Online Book to give Bhupesh Baghel a sizeable sum of cash.
According to the chargesheet, on 25th October Subham Soni summoned Asim Das to Dubai and presented him with money to be passed to the Congress senior leader. The allegations were further supported by a voicemail that was found on Asim Das’s phone in which Shubham Soni gave him directions to transfer between Rs 8 and 10 crore to the Congress stalwart when he returns to India.
The Enforcement Director told a court that Asim Das, before the recent Chhattisgarh assembly elections which witnessed the victory of the Bharatiya Janata Party, worked as a courier for the promoter of the Mahadev betting app in India.
The central agency had arrested Das from a hotel in Raipur in November 2023 just before the Assembly polls in Chhattisgarh after the central agency recovered a sum of Rs 5.39 crore from his hideouts.
The agency informed that promoters of the Mahadev App were sending this money to a particular politician in Chhattisgarh. Asim Das acknowledged that Subham Soni had entrusted him with the assignment to bring the money to Bhupesh Baghel. The email exchanges between Subham Soni and other witnesses, such as Chandrabhushan Verma suggested that Bhim Singh Yadav served as a middleman for Mahadev Online Book when it came to the payment of “liaisoning money.”
The previous disclosure of Bhim Singh Yadav’s role in supplying the “liaisoning money” came to light through Chandrabhushan Verma in his testimony recorded under section 50 of PMLA, 2002.
The agency had previously revealed in its chargesheet that the reportedly illicit proceeds from the app were distributed as bribes to state officials and legislators. It asserted in November that before the first round of the Chhattisgarh elections, a forensic inquiry and Asim Das’s statement had led to “startling allegations” that the promoters of the Mahadev betting app had handed over approximately Rs 508 crore to Bhupesh Baghel.
Baghel, however, refuted the allegations and claimed that the accusations were manufactured to “malign” his reputation.
The Bharatiya Janata Party criticized the Congress shortly after the anti-corruption charges that the former chief minister was involved in the Mahadev betting app case. It declared that he was a “corrupt CM” and his party had robbed the populace of Chhattisgarh.
BJP spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla voiced, “Bhupesh Bhagel was paid over Rs 500 crore in bribes because, for the Congress party, Chhattisgarh has always been an ‘ATM machine’. During the elections, this money was sent to Baghel and it was caught red-handed.”
Mahadev betting App owner accuses former Chattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel of being involved in the scam
On 5th November 2023, Shubham Soni, one of the primary culprits in the Mahadev Betting App case published a video in which he purported to have provided Bhupesh Baghel Rs 508 crores and implicated him of being complicit in the scam.
According to him, extortion began when he met with a man called Verma. He was required to give the latter Rs 10 lakh each month. After some time, Verma requested him to come see “someone” when he called after his men had been arrested once more. Shubham Soni pointed out that Bhupesh Baghel was the “someone” in question and alleged to have sent in a written statement regarding the arrangement he brokered with him.
Following a search operation on 2nd November last year, the Enforcement Directorate which is looking into the Mahadev app for possible money laundering activities on the next day revealed that it uncovered through new evidence that regular payments had previously been made and Bhupesh Baghel obtained about Rs 508 crore from the promoters of the Mahadev app. The agency seized Rs 5.39 crore in cash on 2nd November before the state election.
