ED questions Vadra in Haryana land deal case | India News

GURGAON: Enforcement Directorate (ED) Tuesday interrogated Robert Vadra, the businessman-husband of Congress common secretary and LS MP Priyanka Gandhi at its headquarters for six hours in reference to a controversial land deal his firm Skylight Hospitality had made in 2008 for Rs 7.5 crore.
Vadra, who had missed his first summons on April 8, walked into ED workplace at 11am and was quizzed over two classes with a lunch break on his affiliation with the land deal which gave him a good-looking return of Rs 50 crore in a matter of some months. His questioning will proceed on Wednesday.
This is a brand new case being investigated in opposition to Vadra with two different cash laundering probes nonetheless in progress associated to different land offers in Haryana and Rajasthan. In the current case, Vadra’s agency, Skylight Hospitality, purchased 3.5 acre in Shikohpur ( Haryana) for Rs 7.5 crore in 2008 from Onkareshwar Properties. The then Congress govt in state below the then CM Bhupinder Singh Hooda granted business licences for two.7 acre shortly afterwards. Four months later, the land was offered to DLF for nearly eight instances the speed – Rs 58 crore – producing a revenue of over Rs 50 crore. Vadra slammed ED’s transfer as an ‘try and thwart his entry into politics and cease him from elevating folks’s points’.
Action in opposition to Vadra got here quickly after ED issued notices to take possession of over Rs 750 crore value of land and buildings of Young Indian-controlled Associated Journals Ltd in the National Herald cash laundering case. This was adopted by the company submitting a chargesheet in the National Herald case the place it has made seven people and entities as accused, together with ex-Congress president Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi. The court docket has mounted April 25 because the date of subsequent listening to in order to take cognisance of the chargesheet.
On his solution to ED workplace, Vadra stated motion in opposition to him was “politically motivated”. “I am not going to be intimidated by this. They can ask me as many questions. I will answer them all. I have nothing to hide,” he stated, including, “Whenever I try to raise people’s voice or talk of entering politics, this govt uses these agencies to suppress me. I have appeared over 20 times before, submitted 23,000 documents, and sat for 15-hour sessions. Yet, they keep demanding more.”
Vadra’s land deal in Shikohpur gained nationwide consideration in 2012 when IAS officer Ashok Khemka, then director of land registration in Haryana, cancelled the land mutation, citing procedural irregularities. The state transferred Khemka inside hours, elevating eyebrows. But earlier than relinquishing cost, Khemka submitted a report, setting apart the mutation and questioning the authority of the official who had sanctioned it. In 2013, a three-member IAS panel shaped by the then Hooda govt gave a clear chit to each Vadra and DLF.
Subsequent BJP govt, which assumed workplace in 2014, shaped Justice Dhingra Commission, which submitted a confidential report. Hooda moved HC in opposition to formation of the fee in 2016. Two years later, Haryana police filed an FIR in opposition to Vadra, Hooda, DLF & Onkareshwar Properties, charging them with dishonest, felony conspiracy & forgery. ED initiated a probe below PMLA.