ED arrests Ebix Group chairman Vikas Garg in Mahadev betting app money laundering case

The Enforcement Directorate arrested Ebix Group chairman Vikas Garg in the Mahadev online betting app-linked money laundering case after conducting searches in Delhi. He was granted transit custody to Raipur as investigators probe alleged laundering of betting proceeds through shell entities

New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate on Tuesday arrested Vikas Garg, chairman of the Ebix Group, in the Mahadev online betting app-linked multi-crore money laundering case, officials said. They said Garg, 53, was taken into custody under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) after searches were conducted at his premises in Delhi. He was produced before a special court in Delhi, which granted the central agency 24-hour custody to take him to Raipur in Chhattisgarh, where the investigation is taking place, they said.

Last week, the central agency said in a press statement that it attached assets worth Rs 940.77 crore of Garg, his family and entities linked to him as part of this investigation.

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“The attachment forms part of the ongoing money laundering investigation in the Mahadev Online Book/ Skyexchange illegal online betting case,” the ED said.

The agency has said that the Mahadev betting app case involves various high-ranking politicians and bureaucrats from Chhattisgarh and the alleged proceeds of crime generated in this case stand at Rs 6,000 crore. It had alleged that the illegal betting operations of Mahadev Online Book and Skyexchange (a Dubai-based exchange) were laundered through a multi-layered structure of accommodation (hawala) entries arranged against cash through a web of shell entities and other layered transactions.

Investigation shows that proceeds of the crime worth Rs 940.77 crore of the Mahadev Online Book/Skyexchange betting operations were, in this manner, routed into the entities owned and “controlled” by Garg.

According to the ED, the Mahadev app operated as a large-scale international betting syndicate that facilitated alleged illegal betting through multiple online platforms and domain names such as ‘Tiger Exchange’, ‘Gold365’ and ‘Laser247’. The operation was structured through a franchise-based network of ‘panels’ and ‘branches’ operated by associates across India while the main absconding promoters, Sourabh Chandrakar and Ravi Uppal, operated and controlled the betting syndicate from Dubai, the ED said.

This is the 14th arrest in this case, which names 74 entities as accused in the five chargesheets filed before a special PMLA court in Raipur till now.

The agency has also moved a court seeking fugitive economic offender status (under the Fugitive Economic Offenders Act, 2018) for Chandrakar, Uppal and others named in the case, such as Anil Agrawal alias Atul and Shubham Soni.