Click to play videoMumbai: Hawala operator Hasan Ali's trail is leading investigators down the IT path. CNN-IBN had first reported that some infotech companies in Hyderabad were under the income tax scanner for their role in Ali's network.
Enforcement agencies have now zeroed in on a number of Hyderabad based IT companies involved in money laundering.
I-T Department DG Investigations M Ahmed said, “We are probing a number of IT companies in Hyderabad for their involvement in the money laundering racket."
The companies under investigation executed fake orders from bogus overseas customers, laundered money and folded up after a short while.
Sources in the Enforcement Directorate (ED) tell us that as a that the agency has hired professional Chartered Accountants in Hyderabad to study financial transactions of the IT companies and the Directorate of Income Tax has launched a parallel investigations to track down companies who could be a part of Hasan Ali's network.
The Software Technology Park of India housed in the Maitrivanam Building in Hyderabad is believed to be the incubation centre of many an IT success story.
But now enforcement agencies feel it may also be the breeding ground of one of the largest financial scams ever with over 40 companies having shut shop in this very building in the last one year.
As of now the ED and the IT Department are looking only at the bigger companies but with the promoters being well connected and influential - the agencies are trying to be absolutely sure of their facts before taking action against any of them.
(With Shiekh Ahmed Ali)
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