Sanjay Raut's wife Varsha Raut summoned by Enforcement Directorate in Patra Chawl scam

Even as Shiv Sena's Sanjay Raut continues to be in ED custody, his wife, Varsha Raut was summoned by the agency in the Patra Chawl redevelopment scam, on Thursday. Varsha would be appearing before the Ballard State-based office of the agency for questioning tomorrow, August 5 at 11 am. Sanjay Raut's wife has been called for questioning by the agency, after transactions done from her account came to light.

Rauts & Patra Chawl scam 

In 2007, Guru Ashish Construction Pvt Ltd (GACPL), a wholly owned subsidy of Housing Development and Infrastructure Ltd (DIL), entered into an agreement with the Maharashtra Housing and Area Development Authority (MHADA). As per the agreement, GAPCL was to provide new homes to 672 tenants of the chawl, then develop flats for MHADA and sell the remaining area to private developers.

Pravin Raut and other directors of GACPL did not build a single house for the 672 displaced tenants. They actually sold the Floor Space Index to nine private developers for Rs 901.79 crore. A sum of Rs 100 crore was transferred to Pravin Raut, which was then distributed by Praveen to his close aides which included Varsha Raut, Sanjay Raut.

In this regard, Sanjay was summoned by ED, which is presently probing the case. After he skipped three summons, Sanjay was called by the investigation agency on July 27 for questioning, which he skipped and informed his lawyers that due to the ongoing Parliament session, he cannot attend. Thereafter, on July 31, the agency raided his residence, recovered Rs 11.5 lakh unaccounted cash and took him for questioning to its office. He was taken into custody at 12:05 am under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), and initially, sent to the agency's custody till August 4, which has been extended to August 8.