Nirav Modi's 9 Luxury Cars Seized, Rolls Royce, Porsche Among Them

New Delhi: A fleet of luxury cars including a Rolls Royce Ghost, two Mercedes Benz GL class, one Porsche Panamera, three high end Honda cars and one Toyota Fortuner belonging to Nirav Modi and his group of companies have been seized by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday. 

Officers of the ED said it has also frozen mutual funds and shares worth Rs 94.52 crore of the Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi groups, as part of its investigation, under the money laundering act. Mutual funds and shares worth Rs 86.72 crore belong to Choksi and his group and the rest are owned by the Nirav Modi group, said ED officers. 

ED investigators have stepped up their action against the suspected shell firms linked to Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi. On Wednesday, several ED teams raided offices in four locations of Mumbai such as the Opera House, Peddar Road, Goregaon (East) and Powai. 

"Assets worth Rs 10 crore were seized in the operations on Wednesday", a senior ED official confirmed. The agency is also probing about 120 shell firms linked to Mr Modi and Mr Choksi, the officer said. The total value of gems and gold jewellery seized by the ED stands at Rs 5,736 crore.

Apart from the ED, the Income Tax department has attached assets worth Rs. 145 crore in the alleged Rs. 11,300-crore Punjab National Bank fraud case.

The ED is also seeking information from foreign countries about the business operations of Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi. 

Sources in the ED said that the agency is talking to senior PNB officials and recording their versions to find out how Letters of Understanding were issued and misused. "We are looking at securing the proceeds of crime. The ED will probe how much illicit wealth was created by the accused in the alleged fraud," a senior official said.

(With inputs from agencies)