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By Satyajeet Kumar: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Jharkhand IAS officer Chhavi Ranjan on Thursday for colluding with land mafias to grab large parcels of private and government land in Ranchi.
According to officials, he was confronted with a number of land records that were purposely doctored to change ownership and nature of land to help mafias.
The investigating officer of the case recorded the statement of the IAS officer under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and he will be produced in court on Friday. The ED will then seek his remand, sources said.
He is the second IAS to be arrested by the ED under the PMLA sections. Last year, it arrested 2000-batch IAS officer Pooja Singhal in a money laundering case.
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WHO IS CHHAVI RANJAN?
Chhavi Ranjan is currently serving as director of the state’s Social Welfare Department. He reached the office of the ED around 10.45 am and was arrested after 10-hours of grilling. Ranjan’s wife also reached at ED regional office on Thursday.
His lawyer Abhishek Krishna Gupta told the media, “I don’t have any information of his arrest,” quoted by PTI as saying.
The ED had on April 24, too, questioned Ranjan for about 10 hours in connection with its money laundering investigation into alleged illegal land deals.
(With inputs from PTI)
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