Illegal betting case: Karnataka Congress MLA KC Veerendra arrested from Sikkim

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday arrested Karnataka Congress MLA KC Veerendra Puppy, under the provisions of anti-money laundering law from Sikkim in an alleged illegal online and offline betting case.

As per ED sources, Veerendra, along with his associates, had travelled to Gangtok via Bagdogra on a business visit to lease a land casino.

He was produced before a Judicial Magistrate in Gangtok, Sikkim, from where a transit remand was obtained for producing him before the jurisdictional court in Bangalore.

Earlier, the ED had conducted a search operation on August 22 as well as today at 31 locations across India including Gangtok, Chitradurga, Bangalore city, Hubli, Jodhpur, Mumbai and Goa, which included five casinos namely Puppy’s Casino Gold, Ocean Rivers Casino, Puppy’s Casino Pride, Ocean 7 Casino and Big Daddy Casino.

Searches revealed that the accused Veerendra was reportedly running several online betting sites in the name of King567 and Raja567 among others.

Incriminating material seized during search proceedings indicate complex layering of cash and other funds, ED sources said.

During the searches, ED recovered an amount of approximately Rs 12 crore in cash, including approximately 1 crore in foreign currency, gold jewellery worth approximately Rs 6 crore, around 10 kg silver articles, and four vehicles.

In addition to this,17 bank accounts and two bank lockers were also frozen.

Several property-related documents were also seized from the premises of Veerendra’s brother KC Nagaraj and his son Pruthvi N Raj.

Veerendra’s other associates, namely brother KC Thippeswamy and Pruthvi N Raj, are involved in handling online gaming operations from Dubai, they added.

Thippeswamy is operating three business entities from Dubai, namely Diamond Softech, TRS Technologies and Prime9Technologies, which are reportedly related to the call centre services and KC Veerendra’s gaming business, ED sources said.