ED arrests Delhi-based trader after sale of Rs 1,858 crore crypto assets | Delhi News

NEW DELHI: Crypto has opened up new avenues for hawala dealings. A Delhi trader J S Bagga was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate on Friday after a money trail revealed his syndicate had collected over Rs 4,800 crore cash, using his shop in Kirti Nagar and remitted the money to Hong Kong for payments to Chinese dealers and manufacturers.
The probe began after an intelligence alert received by ED revealed that an unknown company Birfa IT had sold a huge amount of crypto assets and encashed Rs 1,858 crore from an Indian crypto exchange.

Bagga has been remanded to ED custody for a day for further interrogation. Four of his other accomplices were arrested by the agency earlier — Mandeep Mago, Sanjay Sethi, Mayank Dang and Tushar Dang.
Though the accused sold off Rs 1,858 crore of crypto currency on Indian crypto exchange, inquiries revealed that the firm Birfa IT had not bought any crypto assets in India. “It indicated a dangerous scenario of international hawala using crypto transactions,” the ED has said. The probe further revealed illegal foreign remittances worth Rs 4,817 crore against bogus and forged invoices for making compensatory payments for under invoiced imports made from China and Hong Kong.
A search conducted in this case revealed evidence that Mandeep Mago had been making illegal foreign remittances using fake and forged documents. The ED registered a money laundering case under PMLA after an FIR was registered by the crime branch of the Delhi Police.
According to ED, Jaspreet Singh Bagga is in the business of opticals and is a close associate of Sanjay Sethi and Mayank Dang and a member of the syndicate involved in under invoiced imports, sending compensatory payments overseas through hawala channels.
“His shop was an epicentre of cash collection and acted as a hub for unaccounted cash collection from numerous importers. He (Bagga) used to carry daily cash collection to his home at Kirti Nagar which was further collected by cash handlers of Mandeep Mago and was eventually remitted illegally abroad through companies of Mandeep Mago and Sanjay Sethi using fake and forged invoices,” the ED said.
The probe revealed that cash collected by Bagga was layered through various bank accounts operated by the accused persons before being remitted abroad to make compensatory payments to Chinese exporters. Further investigation is under progress, the agency said.