ED raids ex-UP minister, kin’s properties in 3 states; Rs 44L seized
Lucknow: ED teams on Thursday raided properties belonging to jailed ex-UP minister Gayatri Prajapati and his family members at over a dozen locations spread across three states as part of a money laundering probe.
The central agency seized allegedly unaccounted cash totalling Rs 44 lakh and sheaves of documents pertaining to the 13 premises that were searched, including houses in Lucknow, Delhi and Mumbai.
An ED team brought Anurag Prajapati, son of the former minister, from Amethi to Lucknow for questioning. Gayatri’s wife Maharaji, who is a Samajwadi Party MLA representing Amethi, fainted when her private house there was being searched. She was immediately hospitalised, the agency said.
Gayatri, in jail since 2017 after being named in a gang-rape case, has been facing an ED investigation in a disproportionate assets case since 2021. ED has already confiscated properties valued at Rs 36.9 crore owned by him and his relatives. The agency has also frozen 57 bank accounts.
In 2019, ED lodged a PMLA case against Gayatri and five IAS officers for their alleged complicity in a mining scam. CBI separately registered a case for the same offence. Two years later, a special court convicted the former minister of rape.
