Bhubaneswar: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has seized a Toyota Fortuner SUV and Rs 9 lakh in cash from the house of Prayaskanti Samal, son of senior BJD leader and former minister Prafulla Samal, at Pallaspalli, Bhubaneswar during a raid over money laundering allegations.
The vehicle, however, is registered in the name of Trishna Skyscraper Limited, a construction company, reports said on Friday.
The central agency’s officers conducted simultaneous searches at six places of Bhadrak and four in Bhubaneswar on Thursday in connection with alleged financial irregularities to the tune of Rs 20 crore in Bhadrak Institute of Engineering and Technology (BIET) at Barapada. Prayaskanti is the president of BIET. He is accused of swindling the fees of students and investing the money to buy property worth crores of rupees in Bhubaneswar and other places.
The ED also raided the house of former principal of the college, which was reportedly established by encroaching 5.12 acres of land kept for cremation ground of Barapada gram panchayat in Bhandaripokhari block in early 2000. Property of a builder having links with Prayaskanti was also searched. The builder had criminal antecedents and cheating complaints were also filed against him.
Reports further said that the raids were conducted after the district police recently lodged a first information report (FIR), alleging that Samal and his son Prayaskanti were involved in a multi-crore money laundering case.
The former minister told the media that the raids were nothing but a malicious act. “The raids are a conspiracy against my client. We are trying to contact the ED officials but they are neither seeing us nor issuing any statement on the raid. Prafulla Samal has been keeping unwell and needs continuous treatment. The ED officials are harassing him,” said Samal’s lawyer.
Samal is a BJD MLA from Bhandaripokhari in Bhadrak.
BIET offers undergraduate courses like computer science and engineering, civil engineering, electronics and telecommunication engineering, information technology and others. The institute also offers MTech courses.
