Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra has figured in a chargesheet for the first time with the Enforcement Directorate naming her, along with husband Robert Vadra and others, in a supplementary chargesheet filed recently in a money laundering case against defence dealer Sanjay Bhandari and his associates.
However, Priyanka and Vadra have not been identified as defendants in the lawsuit. The chargesheet against C. C. Thampi, who is co-accused with the fugitive Bhandari, was submitted before a special PMLA court on November 21. It concerns land that Thampi, Vadra, and Priyanka purchased in Faridabad.
The agency said Priyanka, Vadra and Thampi bought 531 acres of land in Faridabad between 2005 and 2008 - 486 acres by Thampi, 40 acres by Vadra and 5 acres by Priyanka - all from Delhi-based real estate agent H L Pahwa.
The agency, which is still investigating the case, suspects huge cash transactions in the multiple land deals.
The ED said Vadra and Thampi are also being probed in another 12-acre land deal in Gautam Buddha Nagar in UP.
The agency claimed that after that, all three transferred the land tracts in Faridabad to Pahwa, who then sold them to companies in the DLF group. On December 22, the special PMLA court received the supplementary chargesheet and began the process of filing charges against the defendant.