Congress leader Salman Khurshid’s wife Louise, 2 others laundered government funds, says Enforcement Directorate

New Delhi, March 4

The Enforcement Directorate on Monday alleged that senior Congress leader Salman Khurshid’s wife Louise Khurshid and two others “laundered” Rs 71.5 lakh in central government funds for their personal gain.

The federal agency said in a statement that it has provisionally attached 15 agricultural land parcels located in Farrukhabad district of Uttar Pradesh and some bank deposits, worth a combined Rs 45.92 lakh, of the Dr Zakir Hussain Memorial Trust, under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

A probe found that “grant-in-aid of Rs 71.5 lakh received by the trust was not utilised for holding camps sanctioned by the Government of India but was laundered by Pratyush Shukla, a representative of the trust, Mohammad Athar, secretary to the trust, and Louise Khurshid, project director of the trust, for the interest of the trust and their personal gain”, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) claimed.

In this way, the fund received as grant-in-aid was laundered for their personal gain and leading to generation of proceeds of crime, it said.

The money-laundering case stems from 17 FIRs of the Economic Offences Wing of the Uttar Pradesh police.