Robert Vadra has been questioned by the Enforcement Directorate for the third day today in money laundering and other cases against him. According to reports, today ED confronted him with the detail of Sanjay Bhandari’s interrogation by the Income Tax department in 2016, which show that Vadra has a link with the fugitive arms dealer.
Arms dealer Sanjay Bhandari’s link to Robert Vadra nailed? @itsmunish joins in for more. #ITVideo
More videos: https://t.co/Nounxo6IKQ pic.twitter.com/Qk6VaYjdAI— India Today (@IndiaToday) February 9, 2019
In 2016, offices of Sanjay Bhandari were searched by the Income Tax department in a tax evasion case, when confidential defence ministry documents were found in his possession. The officials had also found emails exchanged between Bhandari and Vadra. Now, the ED has produced a portion of questioning of Bhandari by I-T department on 30th April 2016, where he had agreed that he had booked flight tickets from France to India on the instructions of Robert Vadra. This document was produced by ED when Robert Vadra had denied any link with Bhandari during his questioning. Vadra has been denying any link with Bhandari in the questioning by ED till now.
The document shows that Sanjay Bhandari was asked by the Income Tax officials whether a ticket for Robert Vadra to travel from Nice, France to Delhi in India was booked by him on behalf of and who had made the payment. Answering to that question, Sanjay Bhandari had confirmed that he had booked the ticket on the instruction of Robert Vadra, although he said he did not remember who made the payment.
Earlier, copies of emails had emerged which showed that Sanjay Bhandari was working on the renovation of a property owned by Robert Vadra in London. One email sent by Sumit Chadha, close associate of Bhandari, had talked about payment for work done on the property. Vadra had replied to the same that he will look into the same and Manoj will sort out the matter.
Manoj Arora is Executive Assistant of Robert Vadra and he is also being probed by ED in the money laundering case. Copies of the emails were marked to one email ID [email protected], which is allegedly an email ID of Sanjay Bhandari.
