Enforcement Directorate begins probing 11 Panama Papers firms – Deccan Chronicle

Hyderabad: The Panama Papers are back here to haunt city industrialists. Following directions issued by the Centre, the Enforcement Directorate has begun a probe into 11 companies named in the Panama Papers, the global media investigation into alleged tax evasions which has brought 415 Indians under the scanner of investigating agencies.

Sources said that the probe was initiated under the Foreign Exchange Management Act. A top ED official said, “Based on the Panama Papers, we are looking into the role of several people named in it for Fema violations.”

Mr Ajaya Kumar Malpani, shareholder in Ayna International, located in Vaibhan Apartments here, is one of those being investigated by the ED.

Entrepreneur Moturi Srinivas Prasad, who was secretary of the Jubilee Hills Interna-tional Centre, geologist-turned-businessman Jaya Kumar Bhavanasi, and legal correspondent-turned-businessman Volam Bhaskar Rao are directors of offshore entities that are under the ED scanner.

Mr Prasad was executive chairman of Nandan Cleantech plc in London. The company went in for a public issue recently.

Prasad’s firm had major investors

Moturi Srinivas Prasad was executive chairman of Nandan Cleantech plc in London. The company went in for a public issue recently and major investors like the Dubai government and Lloyds Bank invested in it. Mr Prasad was later a director in BVI Companies, Yes De Ventures SA, Sika Securities Ltd, Bhasu Capitals Ltd and Bee Pee Investments Corp, which had shareholdings in Nandan Cleantech, in the year 2011.

One Radhe Lal of Hyderabad was also being probed by the ED as the name has appeared in the Panama Papers investigation.

Koneru Madhu, son of Koneru Prasad of Emaar, does not figure in the ED probe, though his name has been mentioned in the Panama Papers investigation. Motaparti Siva Rama Prasad, the director of Heritage Foods, had quit after the Panama Papers exposé.

The Panama Papers named industrialists K. Krishna Mohan Rao, V. Malla Reddy, M. Kameswara Rao, and P. Surender Reddy from AP, TS and Chennai as owning offshore companies.

The Panama Papers are an unprecedented leak of 11.5m files from the database of the world’s fourth biggest offshore law firm, Mossack Fonseca. The documents show how secretive offshore tax regimes have helped people – including 12 national leaders – stash their money so that they evade taxes.