Vadra firms had just ₹1L each in bank before deal: ED

Robert Vadra’s two firms had only ₹1 lakh each in their bank accounts when they purchased a 3.53- acre land worth ₹7.5 crore in Gurugram’s Shikohpur in 2008, according to Enforcement Directorate (ED) investigators, who asked not to be named.

The probe has also revealed that after the purchase of land, when Vadra’s firm applied for developing it for commercial activity, the Haryana government approved the licence within four days, the officials added.

Vadra has been questioned in the case by the ED for the past two days and has been summoned on Thursday as well. He was accompanied by his member of parliament wife, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, on Wednesday to the ED headquarters at Dr APJ Abdul Kalam Road.

An official said that Vadra has been confronted with documents related to the land deal and financial transactions, including further sell-off of the land by his company to DLF.

Sharing details of the alleged irregularities and probe findings, one of the officers cited above said, “SLHPL, a company of Robert Vadra, purchased 3.53-acre land in Shikohpur from Omkareshwar Properties Pvt Ltd (OPPL) on February 12, 2008, for ₹7.50 crore, without making any payment”.

However, the probe revealed that “the cheque issued in the sale deed was not issued by SLHPL, but by another group company of Vadra - Sky Light Realty Pvt Ltd (SLRPL). Also, this cheque was never presented to the bank for encashment”, he said.

“Interestingly, both – SLHPL and SLRPL – had credit balance of only ₹1 lakh each in their bank accounts at the time of execution of this sale deed. So, both these entities of Vadra didn’t have sufficient balance to make the payment to the seller for the 3.53-acre land worth ₹7.50 crore,” said a second officer.

This officer added, “Even the funds for stamp duty ( ₹45 lakh) and other charges were provided by OPPL”.

A third officer said that after about six months, SLHPL made a payment of ₹15.38 crore in two tranches to OPPL – much more than the amount mentioned in the sale deed ( ₹7.50 crore), which means “undervaluation of property was done, which leads to suppression of stamp duty and revenue loss to the government”, he said.

The ED probe has further revealed that while OPPL had applied for a commercial licence for this land, it was never issued by Haryana government’s town and country planning department. However, on March 17, 2008, SLHPL informed the department about purchasing this land and applying for a licence to develop it as a commercial colony.

“Within four days, on March 21, 2008, the chief minister of Haryana (Bhupinder Hooda was the CM at that time), gave the approval and a letter of intent was issued by the department on March 28 for developing a commercial colony on 2.701 acres out of the 3.53 acres. The Haryana government didn’t even examine if SLHPL had financial capacity to develop commercial space. It appears that this licence was approved considering the status of Vadra,” said the third ED officer.

Vadra told news agency PTI on Wednesday that he was “being targeted by probe agencies as he is part of the Gandhi family and that things would have been different had he been part of the BJP”.