MUMBAI MIRROR (August 5, 2020)

The Enforcement Directorate on Monday grilled late Sushant Singh Rajput’s former chartered accountant (CA) Sandeep Sridhar in connection with its probe into the alleged money-laundering aspect of the Bollywood actor’s suicide at his Bandra residence. The agency recorded the CA’s statement on details related to the actor’s financial activities, including his income/expenditure/investments and business forays via firms, over the past one year in order as part of its Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) investigation.

“Sridhar’s account will be the key to understanding the state of the late actor’s finances and if there were any alleged irregularities there. His questioning will continue,” said an agency source. Rajput, 34, was found hanging in his Bandra apartment on June 14. Sridhar worked for the late actor over the past one year, agency sources said. Sridhar, whose statement was earlier recorded by the Mumbai police, had earlier told media that there was allegedly no major transfer, except a few thousand, to his girlfriend, actress Rhea Chakraborty’s account.

The agency said on Friday it began a PMLA probe in the case on the basis of a Bihar police First Investigation Report (FIR) registered on a complaint by Sushant’s father, Krishna Kumar Singh (74) against Rhea, her family members and six others on allegations related to abetment of the suicide of his son and financial irregularities. Singh had wanted a probe to ascertain whether Rs 15 crore deposited in a bank account held by Sushant was allegedly transferred. Singh has accused Rhea of having befriended his son in May 2019 with the intention of furthering her own career.

A few firms linked to Sushant and some of his financial activities allegedly involving Rhea and her brother Showik are under the ED scanner. ED is likely to call them both in for questioning in connection with the probe to verify the allegations levelled in the case.ED will determine if there were any irregularities linked with Sushant’s bank accounts and assets.

An ED team today also visited a Navi Mumbai address, located at Sector 8, Ulwe, which serves as the common address of two firms, Vividrage Rhealityx Pvt Ltd and Front India For World Foundation that are under ED’s scanner. In both the firms, Sushant was a director. A case suspect was in the two firms as a director, while another was in one of the firms as a director. “The visit was to verify the address,” a source said.

The Mumbai police are also probing the alleged suicide to determine whether there was any abetment angle and has questioned several top Bollywood producers and directors. Rhea had released a video statement after the ED case was filed, saying the truth shall prevail.