Two co-founders of Ashoka University were among three people arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Saturday in connection with a money laundering, reports said.
According to news reports, co-founders of Ashoka University Pranav Gupta and Vineet Gupta were picked up along with a chartered accountant identified as SK Bansal under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) by the ED. A special PMLA court in Panchkula sent them to five days of ED custody, news agency PTI reported.
Ashoka University's corporate and registered offices in Delhi and campus in Haryana's Sonepat were searched by ED sleuths in connection with the investigation. A total of 17 premises in Delhi, Mumbai, Chandigarh, and Panchkula were covered by the ED after the raids were launched on Friday.
Pranav Gupta and Vineet Gupta had stepped down from their posts in 2022 after the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) registered a case against them and the company in 2021.
The university on Friday said the "Enforcement Directorate has sought information in the matter of investigations into the case of Parabolic Drugs where Ashoka University founders, Vineet Gupta and Pranav Gupta, are directors."
While a statement from the institute on the ED action is awaited, it had said Parabolic Drugs was "in no way linked to the Ashoka University."
"Ashoka University has no past or current relationship with Parabolic Drugs, the company being investigated, and any attempt to create a link is without any basis and misleading," it had said.
The money-laundering case stems from a CBI FIR in which the promoters and the pharma company were booked for allegedly defrauding a consortium of banks, led by the Central Bank of India, of Rs 1,626.74 crore.
According to the sources, the ED suspects that the Guptas "layered and diverted" bank loan funds to the tune of Rs 7 crore to the university.
It has found documents that allegedly show that an amount of the loan funds was transferred in September 2013 to an infrastructure company and was further transferred to Vineet Gupta's bank accounts and of this, he reportedly sent Rs 1 crore to the university.
Another amount of Rs 50 lakh is under the ED's scanner as the agency suspects it was transferred to a sister company of Parabolic Drugs Jamboree Education Private Limited - and subsequently, transferred to the university by Vineet Gupta.
The agency is looking at a total of 20 linked companies as part of the bank-loan fraud case, sources said.
"Vineet and Pranav Gupta are two among the more than 200 founders and donors of the Ashoka University who have contributed to Ashoka's creation and growth in their personal philanthropic capacity and whose individual businesses have absolutely no bearing on the university," the university in its statement said.
