ED cracks down on bookies

Tribune News Service

Mumbai/New Delhi, May 22

With betting on Indian Premier League (IPL) matches peaking with the tournament heading for a close, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) today conducted raids across the country on known bookies and their associates.

According to sources here, ED teams launched co-ordinated raids at several premises in Mumbai, Thane, Ahmedabad, Jaipur and New Delhi.

In Mumbai the raids were conducted in suburban Andheri, near the international airport and Kalbadevi in South Mumbai. Among those raided include several diamond exporters, angadias or couriers and many money-changers suspected to be part of hawala rackets, sources said.

Today’s raids come after some prominent bookies were picked up in different parts of the country earlier this month. ED officials here said the raids conducted by sleuths from its Ahmedabad office followed incriminating information recovered from computers, mobile phones and pen drives recovered from bookies arrested in the earlier raid.

Mumbai police sources say, prominent bookies from the city had long gone into hiding and were operating from off-shore locations. While several bookies are said to be working from Dubai, sources say some could also be operating out of vessels on the high seas.

A team of over 30 officials are part of search teams, the sources said. The searches, earlier this month, were largely in the national capital and its adjoining areas and two Delhi-based alleged bookies were arrested. Over Rs26 lakh was seized then apart from a cache of computer peripherals, mobiles and hard drives, the sources said.

In March this year, the Ahmedabad office of the agency had claimed to have busted the alleged betting racket and arrested some bookies from a farmhouse on the outskirts of Vadodara city in Gujarat. Later, the probe agency arrested 13 others in connection with this illegal activity from Gujarat.

The same office registered a money laundering case against two prime suspects and a few others in connection with the alleged racket suspected to be between Rs1,000 and Rs4,000 crore. The accused had been earlier charged under Sections 418 (cheating), 419 (punishment for cheating), 420 (cheating) and other sections of the IPC by the agency.