LAHORE: After tightening its noose around estranged PTI leader Jahangir Khan Tareen’s JWD Sugar Mills, the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) has now summoned the heads of accounts and sales of the Chaudhry Sugar Mills of the Sharif family to its Temple Road office in Lahore on Wednesday in connection with its ongoing investigation in the sugar scam.
According to a call-up notice issued on Monday, the FIA said that “investigation teams have recovered “humungous” digital and other evidences which “revealed” that the management of the Chaudhry Sugar Mills in active connivance with brokers/frontmen have morphed into a “sugar satta mafia”, which is “ramping up” sugar prices dishonestly and fraudulently through a clandestine network (WhatsApp groups), cheating and defrauding the consumers, especially poor people, thereby fleecing exorbitant and undue prices and subsequently hiding the crime-proceeds into secret, fake and unrelated third party-accounts and assets (money-laundering).”
The notice also says that “evidence also revealed that bogus/fake books of accounts or parallel-books (katcha kathas) are being prepared to disguise these crime-proceeds. Evidence reveals that your sugar-mill is no exception and is knitted closely with the satta mafia”.
The agency, therefore, directed the account and sales heads of the Chaudhry Sugar Mills “to appear in person before the investigation team on 31st March 2021 at FIA Temple Road office without fail”. The FIA has also sought “the actual record of sugar-stocks (reflecting counterparty, CNIC, quantity in MMT, rate per KG, date of sale and lifting) which have been sold since 1st November, 2020, ‘to or through’ the (alleged) sugar satta players as documented in your company’s original ledgers/vouchers.”
“The lists of bank accounts (including account number, title, bank, branch, credit turnover since 1st November, 2020), not bank-statements, which are or had been operated in the name of any employees/riders of your mills or employees/riders of your sugar-brokers, in addition to the list of corporate accounts of your mills,” according to the notice.
The notice further states that “inward and outward remittances (FTTs), since 1st November, 2020, made by or on behalf of your sugar-mills or its directors, CEO, brokers/front-men, whether made through banking-channels, money-exchange companies or hawala. In case of failure to cooperate or make a true disclosure, the agency will precede against the directors/CEO(s) or top-management on the basis of evidence already available regarding your satta mafia linkages.”
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021