The Enforcement Directorate (ED), on Wednesday, temporarily sealed the premises of Young Indian (YI) in the Congress-owned National Herald office in Delhi as part of an ongoing money laundering investigation.
The temporary seal has been put in order to “preserve the evidence” which could not be collected as authorised representatives were not present during the raids on Tuesday, they said.
. Additional police force has been deployed outside the AICC headquarters in Delhi. The rest of the National Herald office is open for use, the official sources added. The notice pasted under signature of the ED investigating officer outside the YI office space said it cannot be opened “without prior permission” from the agency.
Officials said the ED team had emailed the principal officer/in-charge of the office to open the premises for it to carry out raids but the response was awaited.
A day ago, the ED conducted raids at the head office of the newspaper in the national capital and 11 other locations as part of an ongoing money laundering investigation in the National Herald-AJL-Young Indian deal, a week after it questioned Congress chief Sonia Gandhi.
Officials said the searches were carried out under criminal sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to “gather additional evidence with regard to the trail of funds”.
The agency has also interrogated Congress leader Rahul Gandhi multiple times in connection with the money laundering case. The National Herald newspaper is published by Associated Journals Ltd. (AJL) and its holding company is Young Indian. The National Herald is registered in the name of AJL.
