The Enforcement Directorate on Saturday arrested Parabolic Drugs Limited promoters Vineet Gupta and Pranav Gupta and a Chartered Accountant (CA) in an alleged money laundering investigation into a bank fraud case.
The ED’s money laundering probe is based on a case registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in December 2021, in which Parabolic Drugs and 11 others have been accused of cheating a consortium of 12 banks to the tune of ₹1,626.74 crore. The Guptas are also named as accused.
The accused Chartered Accountant has been identified by the agency as S.K. Bansal.
They were arrested following searches at multiple locations in New Delhi, Chandigarh, Panchkula and Ambala of Haryana, and Mumbai.
The Guptas are among the founders of Ashoka University, which on Friday said that it had no past or current relationship with Parabolic Drugs and that any attempt to create a link was without any basis and misleading.
“Vineet and Pranav Gupta are two among the more than 200 founders and donors of 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,” it had said.
The company manufactures bulk drugs and drugs intermediaries. It is alleged that from April 18, 2012, it had not cleared its liabilities towards the suppliers despite that it had been issued Letters of Credit (LCs) for the purpose. As a result, the LCs had started getting devolved.
The CBI alleged that Parabolic Drugs continued to default on debt repayments. It had availed itself of bank finance by allegedly overstating the value of primary security. Internal inquiries by the lending banks revealed several other alleged irregularities.
