On Friday, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) informed that it has frozen 150.22 Bitcoins worth nearly Rs 22.82 crores during a raid on Binance Crypto. The federal agency carried out the search operation under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002 in connection with an ongoing investigation into the mobile gaming application E-nuggets money laundering case.
The Enforcement Directorate in a tweet informed about the action taken in the case and wrote, “ED has carried out a search operation on Wallet/User ID in Binance Crypto Exchange leading to freezing of 150.22 Bitcoins equivalent to Rs 22.82 Crore under PMLA, 2002, in respect to an investigation being conducted relating to the Mobile Gaming Application, namely E-nuggets.”
ED has carried out search operation on Wallet/User ID in Binance Crypto Exchange leading to freezing of 150.22 Bitcoins equivalent to Rs 22.82 Crore under PMLA, 2002, in respect to an investigation being conducted relating to the Mobile Gamming Application, namely E-nuggets.
— ED (@dir_ed) November 11, 2022
The case is based on an FIR filed in February 2021 by the Kolkata police against one Aamir Khan and others in response to a court complaint filed by federal bank officials. Aamir Khan is accused of launching the gaming application E-nuggets with the intent of defrauding people. Over 300 accounts were used to launder money collected from users and transferred some of the money overseas via a cryptocurrency exchange.
On September 10 this year, ED raided six locations linked to Khan in an investigation against the fraud app E-Nuggets, through which thousands of people reportedly lost huge amounts of money.
During the raids, ED recovered a large cache of cash that amounted to more than Rs 18 crores. The bundles of notes were reportedly hidden in various places in Khan’s house, including under the bed. The house where the case was found is registered under the name of Aamir Khan’s father, Nasir Ahmed Khan.
The investigation agency stated in an official press release that 85.91870554 Bitcoins worth USD 16,74,255.7 (approximately Rs 13.56 Cr at the time, based on market exchange rates) discovered in the balance of Binance Exchange had been frozen.
Cryptocurrencies [WRX (WazirX utility token) and USDT] worth Rs 47.64 lakhs were frozen in WazirX accounts. The amount of Rs 5.47 crore unearthed in Aamir Khan’s and his accomplice’s bank account has been frozen. Cash totalling Rs 1.65 crore and 44.5 Bitcoins (then worth Rs 7.12 crore) were seized and frozen from Romen Agarwal’s residence.
Romen Agarwal, who is actively involved in inter/intra-country transactions involving the transfer of ill-gotten money within and outside of countries received from criminals, was apprehended and is currently under judicial custody. In its investigation under PMLA so far, the ED has seized Rs 68.42 crores.
