The Enforcement Directorate, on Friday, claimed that it is probing a claim by a 'cash courier' against Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel in the Mahadev betting app controversy.
The probe agency said it recorded the statement of the 'cash courier', Asim Das, who alleged that the promoters of the betting app paid Rs 508 crore to Baghel so far.
Das was arrested on Thursday by the agency after it recovered Rs 5.39 crore from him in the poll-bound state.
"From the questioning of Asim Das, and from the forensic examination of the phone recovered from him, and examination of an email sent by Shubam Soni (one of the high ranking accused of Mahadev network) many startling allegations have come forth, namely, that regular payments have been made in the past and so far around Rs 508 crore have been paid by Mahadev APP promoters to Bhupesh Baghel, Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh," the ED said in a statement.
Baghel called the development a "joke". "Can there be a bigger joke? If today I catch hold of someone and ask him to take PM Modi's name, will they (ED) interrogate him? It has become very easy to toss someone's reputation," he said.
Several Bollywood celebrities, including Ranbir Kapoor, too were under the agency's scanner as they had attended a gala event on September 18, 2022, to celebrate the success of the app.
Mahadev betting app company, promoted by Sourabh Chandrakar and Ravi Uppal, was allegedly using the online book betting application to enrol new users, create IDs and launder money through a layered web of benami bank accounts, the agency had alleged.
Large-scale hawala operations were done to siphon off the proceeds of betting to off-shore accounts, the ED had said, adding the company owning the app was running operations from Dubai.
The ED had registered a case against the app syndicate under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, on the basis of chargesheet filed by Chhattisgarh Police in July last year naming local operators of the Mahadev Book Panels, Alok Singh Rajpoot, Rampravesh Sahu, Kharag alias Raja Singh and others, for being involved in online betting in live ludo, football, casino games etc. through Mahadev Book websites.
