Gaya: The Serious Fraud Investigation Office (SFIO) of the Ministry of Corporate Affairs (MCA) has arrested one Dorste, a Tibetan national, from Gaya on the charges of being mastermind of running a string of Chinese shell companies in Gurgaon and other parts of the country.
The SFIO sleuth arrested Dorste, when he was allegedly trying flee India via road, on Saturday after the MCA started tightening its noose on the Chinese companies indulging illegal routing of Indian currency, a statement said.
“Dortse is on the Board of Jillian India Ltd and has clearly emerged as the mastermind of the whole racket of incorporating large number of shell companies with Chinese links in India and providing dummy directors on their boards. Dortse had shown himself to be a resident of Mandi in Himachal Pradesh as per the records filed with the Registrar of Companies (RoC),” the statement said.
Earlier, the SFIO carried out simultaneous search and seizure operations on September 8 on the offices of Jillian Consultants India Private Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Jilian Hong Kong Ltd., at Gurgaon, Fininty Pvt Ltd at Bangalore and Husys Consulting Ltd, an erstwhile listed company at Hyderabad.
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Evidence procured during the enquiry by RoC, Delhi, and simultaneous search operations clearly points to dummy directors being paid by Jilian India Ltd. to act as dummies in several shell companies. Boxes filled with company seals and digital signatures of dummy directors have been recovered from the site. The Indian employees were in touch with the Chinese counterparts through a Chinese instant messaging app. Husys Ltd. was also found to be acting on behalf of Jilian India Ltd. Initial observations reveal that Husys Ltd. had a pact with Jilian Hong Kong Ltd. Investigations so far have revealed the possible involvement of these shell companies in serious financial crimes detrimental to the financial security of the country.
The MCA, under whose aegis SFIO operates, had assigned the investigation of Jilian Consultants India Private Limited and 32 other companies to SFIO on September 9. Dortse and one Chinese national are the two directors in Jilian Consultants India Private Limited. Based on inputs and the investigations carried out, it was gathered that Dortse had fled from Delhi NCR to a remote place in the state of Bihar and was attempting to escape India through the road route.
Immediately, a special team was constituted in SFIO which was deputed to the said remote place. In the evening of September 10, SFIO had arrested Dortse, who was later produced in the Jurisdictional Court and orders for his transit remand were obtained.
