The Enforcement Directorate on Wednesday raided several premises of Congress leader and former forest minister Harak Singh Rawat and three Indian Forest Services officers including a retired DFO languishing in the jail for illegal tree felling scam in CorbetteTiger Reserve.

Rawat was BJP’s forest minister prior to joining the Congress before 2022 state election.

ED slueths knocked the doors of Harak Singh Rawat’s house at Defence colony in Dehradun and several other premises in Delhi, Chandigarh, Pauri and Srinagar (Uttarakhand) on Wednesday morning and raids continued till late evening.

Sources informed that ED also interrogated Harak Singh’s family members on the Pakhro Range scam that resulted into massive tree felling inside the protected forest cover of Corbette Tiger Reserve. Around 16 establishments of the Congress leader were raided for his involvement in tree felling money laundering and amassing disproportionate assets and wealth against his known sources of the income.

According to the police sources nearly 7-8 ED officials arrived at the residences of Harak Singh Rawat in the morning and began their search operation. Search team had to call in a key maker to open an iron almirah thst thry failed to open. As told by the key maker the almirah had no cash as it was packed with files and other documents.

ED officials recovered and took hold of piles of documents from the cupboard.

“I was brought at around 11 am to open an iron almirah in the house. Only one lady was present in house at that time. It took nearly one and half hour to make a duplicate key and open almirah” informed Wajid, key maker.

According to the local police officials those present in the home had told that cupboard key was missing and former minister was not present when ED officials with a police team arrived that Harak Singh’s residence.

Four other teams of ED raided the establishments owned by Rawat including a hotel in Srinagar, one hostel and an ayurvedic medical college in Dehradun and his anscestral home at Gahad in Pauri. Team also interrogated Rawat’s mother and other members present at his ancestral village.

Rawat, 63, resigned as forest minister from Pushkar Singh Dhami government 1 and quit the BJP ahead of the 2022 Uttarakhand assembly polls to rejoin joined the Congress party. In 2016 Rawat a cabinet minister in Harish Rawat led Congress government defected along with other party MLAs including former CM Vijay Bahuguna and joined the BJP.

The ED investigation is also linked to the allegations against Rawat and his associates for fraudulently acquiring land in Dehradun district for Ayurvedic college run by a trust linked to a politician and his family. The land was acquired “fraudulently” in the name of his wife Deepti Rawat and some other while the building was constructed by Shrimati Poorna Devi Memorial Trust.

The Uttarakhand government’s vigilance department had also raided Rawat last year in connection with the alleged tiger reserve “irregularities” prior to the matter was given to CBI by Uttarakhand high court.

Other big raids conducted by the ED in Dehradun on Wednesday were at the residences of senior IFS officer and Chief conservator of forest Sushant Patnaik, former Corbett director Rahul and retired DFO of Kalagarh Tiger Reserve, part of the Corbette Tiger Reserve, Kishan Chand in Haridwar.

Patnaik was recently booked by Dehradun police under molestation charges and attempt to outrage the modesty of a woman. Rahul and Kishan Chand were raided for their alleged involvement in Pakhro range tree felling scam as Corbett director and the then DFO.

Unconfirmed sources informed that ED officials had to bring a note counting machine to account for nearly three crore cash recovered from the house of one of the raided forest officials.