The Punjab and Haryana High Court on Tuesday directed the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) and police to arrest Congress MLA Dharam Singh Chhoker if he fails to surrender within 24 hours.
The Congress MLA is facing a money laundering case registered against him by the ED in 2023.
He is considered a close aide of former Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and is seeking re-election from the Samalkha constituency in the state assembly elections.
Haryana Advocate General Baldev Raj Mahajan said that a petition to take action against the MLA was filed in the High Court on Tuesday.
“Dharam Singh Chhoker is a sitting MLA from Samalkha and is contesting elections from there again. He has many criminal cases registered against him. Non-bailable warrants have also been issued, and ED action is pending against him. His anticipatory bail petition has been rejected, yet no action has been taken against him while he openly contests elections,” he told ANI.
“So because of all that, the court has ordered him to surrender or else be arrested by the police,” he said.
“The court also noted that his bail has been rejected and that action should be taken against him, which is why it ordered him to surrender or face arrest by tomorrow,” he added.
Voting for all 90 Assembly constituencies in Haryana will take place on October 5 from 7 am to 6 pm.
In 2023, ED investigated Chhoker and his son, Sikandar Singh Chhoker, after an FIR by Gurugram police alleged that both of them were involved in a real estate fraud.
Sikandar Singh Chhoker was arrested by the ED in March, 2024, for allegedly siphoning hundreds of crores of rupees and defrauding home buyers by booking fake construction expenditures in group entities.
(This news report is published from a syndicated feed. Except for the headline, the content has not been written or edited by OpIndia staff)
