The Enforcement Directorate (ED) and Income Tax (I-T) Department are likely to join the Assam Police in investigating alleged organised financial crimes and acquisition of benami properties by event manager Shyamkanu Mahanta, an accused in the death of Assam's cultural icon Zubeen Garg.
The Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of Assam Police has also unearthed more than 20-year-old financial irregularities allegedly committed by Mahanta during his earlier job at a non-banking financial company (NBFC).
Sources privy to the development told PTI that officials from ED and the I-T Department have already visited the CID headquarters to look into the case.
Assam Police have initiated a separate probe against festival organiser Mahanta for "organised financial crimes" and "acquiring huge amounts of benami properties through money laundering".
"The ED and the I-T Department have visited the CID office and discussed the case with senior officials. They are likely to join the probe with CID, and a formal decision may come very soon," a source said.
The CID seized bundles of incriminating documents and items from Mahanta's home during raids on September 25 and 26, such as multiple PAN cards in the name of the same firm, nearly 30 stamp seals of different companies and government officials, and documents related to several benami properties.
The source, however, declined to share further details, saying that more information in the public domain at this moment may jeopardise the investigation.
To a query whether the ED and the I-T Department will join the probe against Mahanta's alleged fiscal irregularities, CID Special DGP Munna Prasad Gupta told PTI, "I cannot comment on their behalf. It is up to them to decide." The CID is currently probing the case of Garg's death after more than 60 FIRs have been lodged across the state against Mahanta, the chief organiser of the North East India Festival, where the singer had gone to perform, and almost 10 others, including the icon's manager Siddharth Sharma and band members Shekharjyoti Goswami and Amritprabha Mahanta.
Special DGP Gupta is heading a nine-member Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe into the untimely death of Garg in Singapore. Already, four people have been arrested and sent to 14 days of police remand each.
Shyamkanu is the younger brother of former DGP Bhaskar Jyoti Mahanta, who is presently the Chief Information Commissioner of the Assam State Information Commission. Another elder brother of his is Nani Gopal Mahanta, who was the Education Advisor to CM Himanta Biswa Sarma before becoming the Vice Chancellor of Gauhati University.
Another source, on condition of anonymity, said that CID has unearthed more than 20-year-old financial irregularities allegedly committed by Shyamkanu Mahanta when he was working as the Assistant General Manager with the North Eastern Development Finance Corporation Ltd (NEDFi).
"During the course of the investigation, it was found that he, along with two GMs, had given over Rs 14-crore loan to a company named DSS E-Connect Ltd for opening call centres in Assam. Out of the total amount, Rs 8.42 crore was disbursed in 2001 and Rs 6 crore in 2003," he added.
When no call centre was established and no EMI was paid to repay the loan till 2003, an internal probe was initiated by NEDFi in early part of 2004, but it was never completed, the source said.
Prior to the internal probe, the loan to DSS was declared Non-Performing Asset (NPA) on March 31, 2003, he added.
"Mahanta was the project manager of the entire work. In 2004 end, he resigned from NEDFi and joined the Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services (IL&FS) as its Vice President. Later, he left that job too and started his own event management firm, Trend MMS," the source said.
Garg died under mysterious circumstances in Singapore on September 19 while swimming in the sea. He had gone to the Southeast Asian nation to attend the 4th edition of the North East India Festival, organised by Shyamkanu Mahanta and his company.
From the search operation at Mahanta's home last week, the sleuths of the CID seized two PAN cards in the name of his event organising company, 'Trend MMS'.
Further, 28 stamp seals were recovered from his office premises. These included seals in the name of various companies and many government officials.
Several documents were also recovered inside the residence and the office premises of Mahanta, pertaining to the construction of roads under the PMGSY scheme in various districts of Assam as well as in Arunachal Pradesh.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
