Job scam: ED raids two houses in Muzaffarpur, Motihari

Patna: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday conducted raids in Muzaffarpur and Motihari in connection with a job scam and money laundering case.The ED team raided a rented house in Muzaffarpur’s Mithanpura police station area, where the main accused of the gang allegedly resided. However, he had already fled by the time the ED team arrived. The main accused was allegedly part of an organised cheating gang active in the Muzaffarpur-Motihari area. The raids were also carried out in five other states, including West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Gujarat and Uttar Pradesh.The ED team conducted a thorough investigation, seizing documents related to the scam, suspicious bank accounts and other incriminating evidence.The raid was carried out at a rented house located at Rambagh Chauri Nahar Road, Lane Number 15, in the Mithanpura police station area. The ED had received information about an important accused of the fraud gang residing there.When the ED team reached the spot around 6am, the accused had already fled. The accused was identified as Mantu Shah. He was part of the fraud gang.ED officials conducted an investigation at the spot for about five hours. Meanwhile, the documents present in the rented house were thoroughly examined. Several family members of the accused were questioned at length.Initially, the fraud case came to light in the name of Indian Railways, but the investigation revealed that the gang was not limited to railways alone. More than 40 other government organisations and departments were also involved, including the forest department, India Post, income tax, high court, PWD, Bihar govt, Delhi Development Authority, Rajasthan Secretariat, and many other departments.According to information, people associated with this gang created fake email accounts to imitate government domains and sent false joining letters to people. Not only this, to win trust, they even gave some people an initial salary for two to three months. These people were placed in roles like RPF, TTE and railway technicians, so that everything appeared legitimate.According to police sources, the ED team seized transactions related to fraud, suspicious bank accounts and other important documents, which were taken for further investigation.A preliminary investigation revealed that the gang used to extort large sums from unemployed youth by luring them with promises of government jobs. After this, they transferred the money through different accounts and channels, which deepened suspicions of money laundering.House owner Nand Kishore Gupta said, “Mantu left the house in the morning. I too came to know about the ED raid later.”At the same time, the ED conducted raids in Amwa village in the Kotwa block of Motihari, East Champaran district. The raid was conducted at the residence of Saksham Srivastava, son of Ramu Srivastava, in the village.ED officials arrived there from Patna in three vehicles. They began an intensive search of Saksham’s house and conducted a thorough examination of documents.According to police sources, Saksham is accused of defrauding several people of lakhs of rupees in the name of providing railway jobs. He used to collect large sums by luring youth with false promises of railway employment. A case related to monetary transactions had been registered against him earlier in the matter, and he had also gone to jail.So far, no official statement has been issued by the ED regarding any arrests or property seizures.