The Mumbai zonal office of the directorate of enforcement (ED) has seized assets worth Rs37 crore, including cash, bank funds, and demat account holdings, as part of a money laundering probe against Mumbai-based financial consultant Amber Dalal and his company Ritz Consultancy Services. They allegedly duped 1,300 investors of Rs600 crore through a Ponzi scheme.
In
a statement, the ED says its investigation is based on a first information report (FIR) registered by the Mumbai police against Mr Dalal, proprietor of Ritz Consultancy Services. He is accused of taking money from investors through a suspected Ponzi scheme by promising high returns and absconding with their money after giving initial returns. It has been gathered that the amount of money raised by Mr Dalal is more than Rs600 crore from 1,300 investors. He was arrested by the economic offences wing (EOW) of the Mumbai police and is presently under judicial custody.
The ED investigation revealed that Mr Dalal raised money from investors on the pretext of investing the funds in nine commodities such as gold, silver, crude oil, natural gas, zinc, lead, nickel, copper, and aluminium and trading in them, ensuring the capital is safe and promising an annual return of 18%- 22% to his investors. Further, it has been gathered that using the same modus operandi, he raised money from investors in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the US as well.
The ED says its search operations unveiled a network of stockbrokers and investment advisors who brought clients in lieu of commission. "It is also found that payments received from new investments were being utilised to pay out the monthly returns to the old investors. Amber Dalal diverted the funds received in Ritz's account to personal accounts, which were further routed to family members’ accounts and used for creating assets. He has diverted about Rs51 crore to his personal accounts. These funds were used to acquire assets in India and abroad. Eight such immovable properties in India and two such properties have been identified abroad."
"It has further been revealed that other than from banking channels, investments were made through cash as well, which was then infused in books as accommodation entries in connivance with Mumbai-based jewellers. Returns on such cash-based investments were given to investors in India and abroad, including UK and UAE by hawala operators," the ED says.
According to a
March 2024 report from NDTV , many celebrities, including actors Annu Kapoor and Deepak Sharma are among the clients of Mr Dalal.
"The owner of Ritz Consultancy Services, Mr Dalal, worked out of the affluent Lokhandwala area in suburban Andheri and promised investors a return of between 1.6% and 2% per month by investing their money in commodities. Different investors had entrusted sums of between Rs5 lakh on the lower end and several crores on the higher end to him," the report says.
Sources in the Mumbai police say Mr Dalal had been running the business for 15 years and had delivered returns. NDTV spoke to some of his clients, including Mr Kapoor and Mr Sharma, who said Mr Dalal had been giving them the returns consistently, including during the COVID-19 period.
