Rs 4,500 cr of suspected laundering after demonetisation: data

New Delhi, October 6 : In a breakthrough in its fight against black money and shell companies, the Centre received information of over Rs 4,500 crore of suspected laundering in post-demonetisation period by 5,800 of the over 2 lakh companies struck off by the Registrar of Companies. Official sources said on Friday that the government received data from 13 banks regarding the bank account operations and post-demonetisation transactions of some of the 2,09,032 suspicious companies that had been struck off the Registrar of Companies earlier this year. These companies were struck off, and operation of the bank accounts of these suspicious companies was restricted for discharge of their liabilities only. The first instalment of data received from 13 banks pertains to merely 5,800 companies (out of more than 2 lakh that were struck off) involving 13,140 accounts. This in itself is a revealing figure. A few of the companies have been found to have more than 100 accounts to their names.The highest grosser among these is a company having 2,134 accounts, followed by others having accounts in the range of 900, 300 etc.The data pertaining to the pre-demonetization account balances and transactions conducted from the accounts of these companies during the demonetisation period is even more startling.It is informed that, after separating the loan accounts, these companies were having a meagre balance of Rs 22.05 crore to their credit on November 8, 2016.