NEW DELHI: The Enforcement Directorate on Tuesday conducted searches in Tamil Nadu, West Bengal, and Goa as part of a money laundering probe against a Chennai-based company in a Rs 637 crore bank loan “fraud” linked money laundering investigation, official sources said.

Locations in Chennai and Kancheepuram, Kolkata, and some premises in Goa were raided in the case against the entity named Arvind Remedies and its promoter Arvind B Shah, apart from some others are being raided under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), the sources said.

The money laundering case of July 2021 stems from an October 2016 CIB FIR against the accused company and its promoter for “cheating” a consortium of lenders led by the Punjab National Bank (PNB) to the tune of Rs 637 crore, they said.

Annual reports of the company for financial years 2009-10 to 2014-15, audited financials of the company taken from the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA), and 294 bank accounts were analysed, and an “intensive” money trail was prepared by the ED as part of this investigation.

The analysis of the bank accounts shows that the bank funds were “siphoned off” through “shell” (dummy) entities controlled by the promoters, the sources said.