Finance Minister of India, Nirmala Sitharaman, recently assured the Winter session of the parliament that economic offenders were being tracked by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), even after some of them escaped overseas.
“We have not left anyone, even if they fled the country, we’ve gone after them,” announced Sitharaman, during a Lok Sabha debate on Tuesday regarding the first batch of supplementary demands.
In line with the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, the minister said that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) “has successfully restored properties valued at least Rs 22,280 crore from major cases.”
While the ED restored assets worth Rs 22,380 crore to lenders and claimants, the finance minister also informed that at least 2 lakh taxpayers came forward in FY2024-2025 to disclose their foreign assets—more than three times the FY2021-2022 number of 60,467 taxpayers. Sitharaman attributed this to the deterrent effect of the Black Money Act of 2015.
As of June 2024, more than Rs 17,520 crore in demand notices were raised under the Act.
Speaking about the ED action, the finance minister invoked specific cases involving Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, and Mehul Choksi.
Mallya’s properties worth around Rs 14,132 crore were restored to public sector banks, she added. Nirav Modi-connected assets worth a bit over Rs 1,000 crore were restored to both public sector banks and private banks. In the Mehul Choksi matter, properties worth around Rs 2,566 crore would be auctioned.
Speaking about economic offenders, Sitharaman announced, “We are after them. We will make sure that the money that has to go back to banks will go back!”
