The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday said that it has conducted searches at the office and residential premises of three forex dealers and their directors situated in Mumbai and Goa and seized illegal money worth Rs 44.37 lakh. The dealing companies Full-Fledged Money Changers (FFMC,) Sete Mares Global Forex Pvt Ltd, Nemichand Khemraj Forex Pvt Ltd.
“The search resulted in the seizure of Rs 44.37 lakh and assorted foreign currencies worth Rs 9.55 lakh which was in contravention of Foreign Exchange Management Act, 1999 and Rules and Regulation made thereunder,” the ED said in a statement issued. “Further, incriminating documents, laptops, mobile phones, containing information related to hawala transactions, smuggling of foreign currency were also recovered and seized during the search operation,” it added.
These companies, engaged in the business of foreign currency exchange, had deposited huge amounts of cash in the bank accounts on a daily basis and remitted it through RTGS and NEFT to other FFMCs and collected foreign currency in cash which aroused suspicion against these companies. “It was suspected that these companies may be involved in trade based hawala and the foreign currencies collected by these companies were smuggled out of the country to settle transactions abroad”, the ED said.
Further investigation into the matter is underway. (ANI)
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