The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has arrested Amitabh Jhunjhunwala, a former senior executive of the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), and Amit Bapna, a former chief financial officer and chief operating officer of Reliance Capital Ltd, in connection with an ongoing money‑laundering investigation linked to an alleged banking and loan‑fraud scheme involving ADAG‑linked finance companies. The probe centres on an alleged fraud exceeding ₹40,000 crore, with investigators claiming that more than ₹11,000 crore of public funds routed through Reliance Home Finance Ltd (RHFL) and Reliance Commercial Finance Ltd (RCFL) later turned into non‑performing assets (NPAs) and were siphoned off via shell‑company networks.
Both Jhunjhunwala and Bapna, described by the ED as close aides of industrialist Anil Ambani, have been apprehended under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) and produced before special‑court judges in Mumbai, where the ED sought custodial‑remand orders for extended interrogation. The agency has also expanded the scale of attachment orders, provisionally seizing assets worth over ₹15,000 crore–₹17,000 crore across multiple cases, including high‑value real‑estate, bank‑account balances and other financial holdings branded as “proceeds of crime.” Among the properties attached is a premium Mumbai residential property valued at over ₹3,600 crore, along with 31 immovable properties worth ₹581.65 crore spread across Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi and Karnataka.
Regulators and the ED allege that the accused routed funds through a web of dummy or shell companies with minimal genuine operations, layering transactions to obscure the trail of diverted bank loans and investable funds. The investigation has also uncovered cross‑border financial flows, with earlier probes looking at the use of laundered money to buy a Manhattan apartment worth more than ₹70 crore and suspected transfers to a Dubai‑linked entity. The Supreme Court has separately flagged the need for coordinated, time‑bound probes into large‑scale frauds linked to Reliance Communications and related entities, urging the ED and CBI to work jointly.