THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: It is a classic case of the hunter becoming the hunted. The Enforcement Directorate (ED), which has been weaponised by the Union Government to harass and browbeat political rivals, for a change, finds itself at the receiving end, in Kerala.
The ED got it in the neck with the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau (VACB) receiving three complaints alleging malpractices by officials of the ED. Needless to say, the complaints have raised serious concern about the credibility of the central agency, whose conduct has evoked strong criticism from even the Supreme Court.
It all began when an assistant director with the ED’s Kochi unit was named prime accused in a Rs 2-crore bribery case, in which three middlemen were also arrested. That was only the tip of the proverbial iceberg. The VACB received three more similar complaints which are being probed by it.
This has been confirmed by the Ernakulam SP of the VACB who admitted having received some complaints. The VACB is in the process of assessing their authenticity and collecting more information. Shekar Kumar, assistant director of the ED, Kochi, has been named as the prime accused in the bribery case based on an investigation conducted following a complaint from Aneesh Babu, a Kottarakkara-based businessman engaged in the export of cashew to African countries. Aneesh had been interrogated by the ED last year over alleged irregularities in transfer of funds overseas.
The case was registered after the VACB nabbed Wilson Varghese, a resident of Thammanam in Kochi and middleman, accepting the bribe. This led to the arrests of Mukesh Jain alias Murali, a Rajasthan native living in Kochi, on Friday, and Renjith Warrier, a chartered accountant based in Kochi. All the three are now in judicial custody.
The Ernakulam SP of the VACB also hinted at more arrests if any specific cases of wrongdoing come to light. He also averred that stringent legal action will be taken regardless of the accused’s position.
Meanwhile, Aneeshbabu, the complainant in the bribery case, has accused ED deputy director Vinod Kumar of mental harassment. Aneesh told reporters that the officer had summoned him into his cabin, abused him and forced him to sit on the floor!
Incidentally, this is not the first time that the ED has been accused of financial misconduct and other serious charges. Such allegations have resulted in high-profile inquiries by special units. For instance, in December 2024, an ED assistant director was arrested in a scholarship scam in Himachal Pradesh. The allegation was that bribes amounting to Rs 85 lakh and 80 lakh were demanded from the promoters of educational institutions in the State. Consequently, the ED official and his brother, a senior manager at the Punjab National Bank (PNB) in Delhi were arraigned. The manager was reportedly caught red-handed while accepting a bribe of Rs 55 lakh. The ED official however, escaped as he was tipped off about the operation!
Another instance of financial misconduct by the ED officials came to light in Karnataka in 2024. Two senior ED officials were arrested after a social department officer accused them of pressuring him into falsely implicating Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and former minister B. Nagendra in a tribal welfare fund scam. The complaint led to the Wilson Garden police registering a case under the Bharatiya Nyaya Samhita.
As if this was not enough, in December 2023, the Tamil Nadu Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption arrested officer Ankit Tiwari from the ED’s sub-zonal office in Madurai while he was accepting a bribe of Rs 20 lakh from a doctor. The arrest led to the ED lodging a counter-complaint against the DVAC of stealing sensitive documents during the raid. Then it was the turn of the Madurai City police to register a case against ED officials for obstructing the DVAC from doing their duty.
In another development, the ED’s Kochi unit has denied the allegations of bribery by Aneesh Babu against officers of the central agency. The ED, in its defence, said the complainant, who is under investigation for money laundering, is attempting to “malign the image” of the ED through a “media trial”.
There are also reports that the ED officers, under a cloud, have moved the court for anticipatory ail, fearing arrest. (IPA Service)
