New Delhi (Animesh Singh) : The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has filed a charge sheet against jailed former Punjab minister and AAP MLA Sanjeev Arora for his alleged involvement in an over Rs 102-crore money laundering probe linked to alleged fraudulent Goods and Services Tax (GST) transactions pertaining to fake mobile phone (iPhone) export bills.Arora was arrested by the ED on May 9 this year on alleged money laundering charges. He is currently in judicial custody and has filed a plea in the Punjab and Haryana High Court seeking regular bail.
According to the charge sheet filed by the anti-money laundering agency in a Gurugram court, the probe revealed that Hampton Sky Realty Limited (HSRL, which is the co-accused in the case along with Arora, who is its promoter-director), formerly known as M/s Ritesh Properties and Industries Limited (RPIL), under the control and direction of the AAP leader, allegedly orchestrated a complex scheme of trade‑based money laundering through false and bogus mobile phone export transactions.
The scheme involved routing funds through shell and accommodation‑entry entities without genuine supply of goods, creating a fictitious and operationally impossible supply chain of mobile phones, inflating export values to claim incentives and GST benefits, and using pre‑funded export remittances and group‑entity investments to project illicit funds as legitimate business income and capital, the ED charge sheet said.
The modus operandi operated in three interconnected layers: creation of a false domestic procurement trail, manipulation of export documentation and customs processes, and integration of funds through export remittances, GST refunds and investments into group entities and immovable properties.
HSRL purportedly purchased high‑value Apple iPhones and other electronic devices from multiple supplier entities such as M/s SK Enterprises, M/s Global Traders, M/s Worldwide Electronics, M/s GMG Tradelink Pvt. Ltd., M/s Shree Lakshmi Enterprises, M/s Mobile Style, M/s US Enterprises, M/s Anjani International, M/s Maruti Nandan Telecom LLP and others.
Detailed examination of these entities and statements recorded under Section 50 of the PMLA, 2002 established that several of them were shell or accommodation‑entry concerns with negligible or no genuine business activity, used purely as vehicles for routing and layering funds against cash, states the charge sheet.
Statements of key HSRL staff confirmed that no physical receipt, storage or inspection of mobile phones ever took place and that they handled only invoices, e‑way bills and banking documentation and had no knowledge of the actual existence or movement of goods.
The company staff also admitted that no purchase orders were issued to suppliers and that communications were largely through WhatsApp, with no verifiable records. The evidence demonstrates that HSRL and its associates created a fabricated domestic procurement chain through shell entities.
The investigation has, at this stage, quantified proceeds of crime of Rs 102,99,21,974 arising from the fictitious export transactions undertaken through 43 shipping bills.
The probe also revealed that Sanjeev Arora was the key decision-maker behind the mobile phone export business carried out by Hampton Sky Realty Limited, though the company was primarily engaged in the real estate sector.
Material gathered during investigation specifically revealed that Arora was the authorised signatory of ICICI Bank account maintained for the mobile division and that the said account was used for receipt of approximately Rs 102.50 crore of export proceeds constituting proceeds of crime.
