Sunday | Apr 27 2025 | 05:53:38 AM
New Delhi, April 16
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) questioned businessman Robert Vadra for six hours in connection with a money laundering case linked to a land deal in Shikohpur, Haryana.
Vadra was earlier summoned by the agency on April 8 but did not appear. A second summons was then issued. Vadra, accompanied by his supporters, walked from his residence at Sujan Singh Park to the ED headquarters on APJ Abdul Kalam Road.
Vadra told reporters he was hopeful for a resolution. “Nobody is evading anything. I am here today… I am expecting a conclusion. I am waiting for a conclusion,” he said before heading in.
Vadra alleged that attempts were being made to silence him. “When I speak in favour of the people, for the minorities and for the failure of government, I am stopped. This is political vendetta,” he said, adding, “People love me and want me to join politics… When I express my willingness to join politics, they bring up old issues to bring me down and divert from the real issues…”
He further claimed, “They are misusing all these agencies… I don’t have to hide anything, whatever they will ask, I’ll give answers to all the questions.”
Speaking to reporters outside the ED office at the lunch break, Vadra said he was willing to cooperate with the investigation but stressed the need for closure. “How can you be talking about something that happened in 2007? There is nothing in the case, it will not take them 20 years to find out something, I have visited 15 times, and also provided 23,000 documents, now they are asking again to provide the same 23,000 documents,” he said.
As per the case details, in 2018, an FIR was registered against Bhupinder Singh Hooda, who served as the chief minister of Haryana from 2005 to 2014, as well as against Vadra, and real estate companies DLF and Onkareshwar Properties, for alleged criminal conspiracy, cheating, fraud, forgery, and under provisions of the Prevention of Corruption Act. Hooda, Vadra, and the Congress party have consistently denied any wrongdoing.
In February 2008, Skylight Hospitality — launched by Vadra in 2007 with a capital of Rs 1 lakh — purchased about 3.5 acres of land in Manesar-Shikohpur in Gurgaon from Onkareshwar Properties for Rs 7.5 crore. The plot was mutated in Skylight’s favour the next day, and the title was reportedly transferred to Vadra within 24 hours of the purchase — a process that typically takes at least three months.
A month later, the Haryana government, then headed by Hooda, granted Skylight Hospitality permission to develop a housing project on most of the land. This led to a sharp increase in the land’s value. In June 2008, DLF agreed to buy the plot for Rs 58 crore, which meant that in just a few months, the value of Vadra’s property had risen by nearly 700 per cent. The payment was made in instalments, and it was only in 2012 that the mutation of the colony licence on the land was transferred to DLF.
