Chinese loan apps: ED freezes over ₹46-cr worth funds kept in payment gateway accounts
The Enforcement Directorate on Friday said it has frozen ₹46.67 crore funds of merchant entities kept in four online payment gateway accounts of Easebuzz, Razorpay, Cashfree and Paytm after it carried out raids this week against a "Chinese-controlled" investment token app.
The funds have been frozen under the anti-money laundering law.
The latest action comes after the agency earlier this month raided the Bengaluru premises of Razorpay, Paytm and Cashfree over alleged irregularities in the operations of instant app-based loan giving companies "controlled" by Chinese persons and later similar seizure order for ₹17 crore funds kept in their accounts was issued.
The latest searches were launched on September 14 at multiple premises of the accused in Delhi, Mumbai, Ghaziabad, Lucknow and Gaya in a money laundering case being probed against an app-based token called HPZ and its related entities.
Sixteen premises of banks and payment gateways in Delhi, Gurugram, Mumbai, Pune, Chennai, Hyderabad, Jaipur, Jodhpur and Bengaluru were also searched by the ED officers as part of the same operation, the federal agency said in a statement.
The ED case, filed under criminal sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), stems from an October, 2021 FIR filed against the accused company and its linked persons by the cyber crime unit of the Kohima Police in Nagaland.
"During the search, various incriminating documents have been recovered and seized.
"Huge balances were found to be maintained in the virtual accounts of the involved entities with payment aggregators like ₹33.36 crore was found with Easebuzz Private Limited, Pune, ₹8.21 crore with Razorpay Software Private Limited, Bangalore, ₹1.28 crore with Cashfree
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