ED raids 5 establishments of Digambar and relatives
GOANEWS DESK, PANAJI | 20 August 2015 09:48 IST
Five establishments of former chief minister Digambar Kamat and his close relatives were raided today early morning by Enforcement Directorate, in connection with Louis Berger bribery case.
The raid, started at 6 in the morning, was conducted in Panaji and Margao.
The local office of ED had filed FIR on 7 August against unknown former Goa minister and officials of Louis Berger International Inc.
ED officials, with the help of the staff of crime branch of Goa police, conducted raids at the houses and offices of Kamat as well as his brother-in-law and daughter-in-law’s ‘original’ residence and offices.
Besides Margao, raids in Panaji were conducted above Vinanti restaurant, opposite Mum’s Kitchen restaurant at Campal, Alfran Plaza as well as at Altinho residence.
Sources in the crime branch also confirmed that they assisted the raids conducted by ED officials.
ED has filed the FIR under Prevention of Money Laundering Act, based on the FIR filed by the crime branch.
The crime branch has already implicated Kamat as well as former PWD minister Churchill Alemao in the bribery case.
Kamat has even managed to get anticipatory bail yesterday before the crime branch could arrest him along with Alemao, on 5 August.
Alemao, arrested after Kamat filed anticipatory bail on 5 August, is still in the judicial lock up, after spending eight days in the police lock up.
The crime branch had also arrested three more persons in the case, including Louis Berger former official, the hawala operator as well as project director of local office of the project funded by JICA.
Two of them – former Louis Berger official Satyakam Mohanty and hawala operator Raichand Soni – have been released on bail.
A M Wachasundar, the suspended project director, is still in the judicial lock up, along with Alemao.
While yesterday’s anticipatory bail was considered to be a big relief for Kamat, the action of ED has raised eyebrows afresh.
While crime branch deals with the criminal angle of the case, the ED deals with the financial matters.
Both Kamat and Alemao Kamat are facing a serious charge of accepting huge amount of bribes from Louis Berger International Inc., the US-based consultancy firm.
The firm has admitted before the Department of Justice in New Jersey of paying bribes of total Rs six crore to ‘a’ minister and government officials in Goa to get the consultancy contract of JICA project.
Louis Berger was selected for consultancy to implement the project, worth Rs 1031 crore, funded by Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA).
Senhor Ghanekar,
You may not have much control over being someones relative, but definitely you can have a control over whether you would like to share your relatives ill-gotten wealth or not. The greed of wealth (at any cost) among Goan politico and general populace is pretty disturbing.
Digamber and Lawandes became 'SOYRES' when Digamber was running a grocery store in Margao.