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Sitaram Yechury accuses PM Modi of letting Nirav Modi escape

Senior CPI-M leader Sitaram Yechury on Thursday accused the Narendra Modi government of allowing diamond trader Nirav Modi to escape with…

Sitaram Yechury accuses PM Modi of letting Nirav Modi escape

CPI-M General Secretary Sitaram Yechury (Photo: Facebook)

Senior CPI-M leader Sitaram Yechury on Thursday accused the Narendra Modi government of allowing diamond trader Nirav Modi to escape with public cash as he shared a picture of the two in Davos, a week before the FIR was filed against the billionaire jewellery designer.

In a series of tweets, the General Secretary of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) said there was “a pattern” in how people who have defrauded banks are “allowed to escape” by Modi government as he demanded answers from the prime minister.

“There is a pattern in how people who have defrauded Banks in India, are allowed to escape by the Modi govt,” he tweeted.

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“If this person had fled India before the FIR on Jan 31, then he is here, photographed at Davos with PM, a week before the FIR, after having escaped from India? Modi govt must clarify,” Yechury said in another tweet along with a picture of the diamond trader and the prime minister.

A day after a massive $1.8 billion fraud was unearthed in a Punjab National Bank (PNB) branch, the Enforcement Directorate on Thursday launched a nationwide raid on the offices, showrooms and workshops of Modi.

ED teams carried out simultaneous raids on Modi’s offices, showrooms and diamond workshops in Mumbai, Surat (Gujarat) and New Delhi.

ED officials landed at Firestar Diamond Pvt Ltd. head office in Bharat Diamond Bourse, in Bandra Kurla Complex, Modi’s private office at Kohinoor City in Kurla West, his showroom and boutique at Itts House in Fort in south Mumbai and a workshop in Peninsula Business Park in Lower Parel.

In Gujarat, six diamond workshops were raided in Surat SEZ at Sachin town and an office in Belgium Towers on Ring Road, the hub of diamond jewellery trade.

Two diamond jewellery boutiques of Modi in New Delhi – in Chanakyapuri and Defence Colony – were also raided.

The multi-pronged action came a day after PNB admitted to unearthing a fraud of Rs.11,515 crore involving Modi’s companies and certain other accounts with the bank’s flagship branch (Brady House) in Mumbai and its second largest lending window in India.

At least 10 bank employees have been suspended but it is not clear whether anybody from the crucial PNB Credit Approval Committee or its Board of Directors figure among them.

The fraud, which includes money-laundering among others, concerns the Firestar Diamonds group in which the CBI last week booked Modi, his wife Ami, brother Nishal and a maternal uncle Mehul Choksi.

It followed a complaint lodged by PNB on January 29 pertaining to an alleged cheating case of Rs 280 crore perpetrated by these four in 2011.

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