The tables turned on the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday when the central probe agency’s zonal office in Ranchi was raided by the Jharkhand Police.
Police collected the CCTV footage from the ED office in connection with an investigation into an alleged assault, reported news agency PTI.
The probe agency approached the Jharkhand high court against the raid, which ordered a stay on the probe against the ED in the case, which was filed by a Jharkhand government employee.
Why was ED’s Ranchi office raided by the police?
Police personnel turned up at the ED office in the morning, after the former drinking water and sanitation department employee Santosh Kumar filed a police complaint on January 12, alleging that he was “thrashed” by ED officials during interrogation into an alleged water supply scam, PTI reported.
Sources quoted in the report said that the team comprised a DSP-rank officer and the airport police station in charge.
A Ranchi police officer said that they were scrutinising CCTV footage of the ED office in view of the assault allegations.
The development becomes even more intriguing as it comes on the heels of the confrontation between the West Bengal Police and ED officials, after the probe agency conducted searches at the office of the political consultancy firm I-PAC and the residence of its chief, Pratik Jain, amid allegations of forced entry and the theft of documents.
The Jharkhand high court order
The Jharkhand high court on Friday stayed the police probe against the ED in the alleged assault case and said that the Ranchi senior superintendent of police (SSP), Rakesh Ranjan, would be held responsible for any security lapse there.
Justice Sanjay Kumar Dwide, while hearing a writ petition filed by the ED, directed the central agency to make the Union home secretary a party in the case.
The court ordered the Union home secretary to depute CRPF/BSF or any other paramilitary force to provide security to the ED office and its officers.
The ED counsel informed the court that the central agency was investigating an alleged scam involving ₹23 crore by Santosh. He also informed the court that the ED has already recovered ₹ 9 crore in the matter.
Opposition targets the Hemant Soren government
Meanwhile, Leader of Opposition in the Jharkhand Assembly, Babulal Marandi, alleged that, under the guise of a police action at the Enforcement Directorate office, attempts could be made to tamper with and destroy crucial evidence in cases involving chief minister Hemant Soren.
“Information has been received that the ED’s regional office located on Airport Road in Ranchi is being surrounded by @ranchipolice. The ED office contains important evidence related to thousands of crores of rupees in corruption cases involving Chief Minister @HemantSorenJMM. There is apprehension that under the guise of police action, tampering with or destruction of these crucial pieces of evidence may be attempted,” Marandi said in a post on X.
Soren had, in January 2024, lodged a police complaint against senior ED personnel at the SC/ST police station in Ranchi over searches conducted by the agency at his Delhi residence in a money laundering case linked to an alleged land scam.
Soren claimed that the ED conducted the searches to “harass and malign him and his entire community”, according to the FIR.
“My family members and I have suffered and experienced immense mental, psychological and emotional harm because of the acts committed,” Soren stated in the FIR.
The CM was questioned by the ED as part of an investigation into a “huge racket of illegal change of land ownership by the mafia” in Jharkhand.
