TNN | Apr 26, 2011, 02.39am IST

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Black-money-ED-questions-Iqbal-Singh-on-Hasan-Ali-links/articleshow/8085779.cms

NEW DELHI: A five-member Enforcement Directorate team from Mumbai questioned Puducherry Lieutenant Governor Iqbal Singh on Monday at his official residence on his alleged links with Pune-based punter Hasan Ali. The latter is embroiled in one of the country's biggest money laundering cases being investigated worth $8 billion.

Singh has already clarified that though he had recommended Ali's case for expeditious issue of passport, he never knew Ali personally. ED questioned Singh on his association with Ali and Kashinath Tapuriah, an associate of Ali.

After facing criticism from the Supreme Court for its lax probe in the case, the ED has brought high political offices under scanner.

The decision to summon Iqbal Singh and a UP top bureaucrat was taken after key Ali aide and a Congress functionary from Bihar, Amlendu Pandey, stated under oath that he had been in regular contact with both Singh and the UP babu.

Pandey was questioned recently by ED officials in Mumbai. He allegedly helped Ali obtain a passport from Patna under forged documents.

The ED is investigating Tapuriah's UP connection. Both Tapuriah and Pandey had allegedly accompanied Ali to Singapore for opening of bank accounts.

Earlier, in a written explanation to home minister P Chidambaram, whom he met recently, Singh admitted that he had written a letter to the ministry of external affairs (MEA) in 1997 recommending renewal of the passport of Chandrika Tapuriah, wife of Kashinath Tapuriah, who is presently in judicial custody in the case.

In his letter, Singh said that on April 4, 1997, Pandey approached him for issuance of passport from Patna for someone on compassionate grounds. "Pandey told me that the brother of the person seeking passport was seriously ill abroad and presence of the applicant for looking after him was extremely essential. In view of the plea, explained by Amalendu Pandey, a known Congress leader, I referred the case to the then minister of external affairs I K Gujral on April 4, 1997," Singh had stated in his letter.

Singh revealed that the Tapuriahs had claimed their proximity to Kolkata-based Birla group, something that ED is also investigating in their ongoing investigation and in the trail of Ali's transactions.

"Chandrika Tapuriah also spoke to me and requested me to help her in the renewal of her passport on an urgent basis due to a medical emergency. Again on compassionate grounds I wrote a letter to the joint secretary in the MEA for renewal of her passport. After that, I have absolutely no link with Tapuriahs and no one has ever contacted me on their behalf," Singh had claimed.