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MUMBAI: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has provisionally attached NCP leader Praful Patel’s residence on the 15th floor of Ceejay House on Annie Besant Road in Worli and three other floors below which are under the ownership of his family members. The action comes in a money laundering case linked to late drug smuggler Iqbal Memon alias Mirchi.
The Patel family had a plot at Worli and they had allegedly purchased an adjoining plot from Iqbal Mirchi over two decades ago. Praful Patel’s company Millennium Developers amalgamated the plots and constructed a 15-storey commercial building, Ceejay House, on it. The top floor of the building is used by the former aviation minister as his residence. He handed over 14,000 sq ft on the third and fourth floor of the building to Iqbal Mirchi’s kin through a registered agreement in exchange for their plot. These floors were attached by the ED last year and it shifted one of its offices to this premises.
The ED had initiated a money laundering investigation against late Iqbal Mirchi and his family members in 2019. Earlier, ED had recorded Praful Patel’s statement in the case twice. He had claimed that he never met Mirchi and that a common contact had negotiated the land deal. TOI tried to contact Praful Patel on Thursday for his comment but he was not reachable.
The plot was originally in the possession of M K Mohamed, who ran Guru Kripa Restaurant on a portion of the plot at Worli. In 1985, Mirchi had purchased the plot from M K Mohamed and started a discotheque named Fisherman’s Wharf on it after encroaching on an adjoining garage and a building compound. In 1992 Mirchi fled the country to avoid arrest in various drug related cases. The disco was later shut down, and in 1999, Millennium Developers entered into a pact with Mirchi’s wife Hajra, to develop the plot along with an adjoining plot that was with the Patel family. Mirchi died in London in 2013.
The Patel family had a plot at Worli and they had allegedly purchased an adjoining plot from Iqbal Mirchi over two decades ago. Praful Patel’s company Millennium Developers amalgamated the plots and constructed a 15-storey commercial building, Ceejay House, on it. The top floor of the building is used by the former aviation minister as his residence. He handed over 14,000 sq ft on the third and fourth floor of the building to Iqbal Mirchi’s kin through a registered agreement in exchange for their plot. These floors were attached by the ED last year and it shifted one of its offices to this premises.
The ED had initiated a money laundering investigation against late Iqbal Mirchi and his family members in 2019. Earlier, ED had recorded Praful Patel’s statement in the case twice. He had claimed that he never met Mirchi and that a common contact had negotiated the land deal. TOI tried to contact Praful Patel on Thursday for his comment but he was not reachable.
The plot was originally in the possession of M K Mohamed, who ran Guru Kripa Restaurant on a portion of the plot at Worli. In 1985, Mirchi had purchased the plot from M K Mohamed and started a discotheque named Fisherman’s Wharf on it after encroaching on an adjoining garage and a building compound. In 1992 Mirchi fled the country to avoid arrest in various drug related cases. The disco was later shut down, and in 1999, Millennium Developers entered into a pact with Mirchi’s wife Hajra, to develop the plot along with an adjoining plot that was with the Patel family. Mirchi died in London in 2013.
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