No End to Hemant Soren’s Car-Nama: Whose Blue BMW Is It Anyway? ED Still Looking for Answer

Who owns the blue BMW car seized from Jharkhand’s former Chief Minister (CM) and Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) leader Hemant Soren’s official residence in Delhi? A week into the Enforcement Directorate (ED) investigation, the mystery has deepened.

While the new documents accessed by the ED show the car is owned by a company associated with Congress MP Dhiraj Sahu, some of the electronic evidences with the agency show the buyers handed it over to Soren.

The central agency has seized the sale receipts and other documents of the car, which show it was bought in the name of a company, address of which is associated with one of the premises owned by Sahu. News18 has a copy of the sale receipts.

‘WAYS TO DELETE EVIDENCE’ DISCUSSED ON WHATSAPP GROUPS

Apart from the purchase papers, the agency has retrieved electronic evidences from the seized laptops and mobiles of some of the accused, and found that there are WhatsApp groups named ‘ED-HSoren Car’.

The members of the group discussed ways to erase the details and the probable electronic evidences about cars sent to “H Soren’s house". They also talked about removing some of the accused from the group, News18 has learnt.

NOT MY CAR: SOREN, SAHU

Soren, before his arrest in connection with a land scam on January 31, released a video message stating he never owned the BMW car. The ED later summoned and interrogated Sahu in connection with the seizure, after finding links between him and the company that owned the car. Sahu, too, denied his involvement in the purchase of the car.

According to senior ED officials, the investigation into the moveable and immovable assets of Soren is still on. The assets, if seized by the ED, would be produced as evidence and proceeds of crime, said the officials.

In the petition to extend Soren’s custody, the ED said, “The accused person has acquired proceeds of crime and has been misusing his position to destroy evidences linked in this case to show him dissociated from the properties under investigation. The investigation to identify the proceeds of crime freshly surfaced proceeds of crime and the trail of the money linked to it is required for taking action under PMLA, 2002."

“That the statement of others in this case is continuing and the outcome of the proceedings under section 50 of PMLA, 2002 are being corroborated with the statements of Shri Hemant Soren. Fresh searches were also conducted on 07.02.2024 in relation to this case and fresh incriminating evidences have surfaced. The analysis of the seizures is going on vis-a vis the statement of the persons connected with it," the directorate added.