This Article is From Mar 23, 2011

Black money: Hasan Ali's accountant's residence raided

Black money: Hasan Ali's accountant's residence raided

Hasan Ali

Pune: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday conducted raids at the residence of Hasan Ali's chartered accountant, Sunil Shinde, in Pune. Mr Shinde has been Hasan Ali's accountant since 2007.

Mr Ali is believed to have 8 billion dollars in black money in foreign bank accounts. He was arrested earlier this month and moved to Mumbai from Pune, where he is known for his lavish cars, homes, horses and parties. (Read: Who is Hasan Ali?)

He has been asked to pay Rs 70,000 crore as a penalty for tax evasion.  His lawyer claims that Mr Ali is innocent of all the charges against him.

The Supreme Court had last week cancelled his bail. He is currently in ED's custody. The court had earlier suggested that Mr Ali be tried on terror charges because his activities seemed to involve a threat to "national security."

The Supreme Court has referred repeatedly to the government's inaction against Mr Ali in the context of a case that it is hearing on black money. The Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by former Law Minister Ram Jethmalani among others asks the government to recover crores of unaccounted-for money that has been stashed in foreign banks by Indians.
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