The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has temporarily seized the house of Bholath Congress MLA Sukhpal Khaira in Chandigarh’s Sector 5 under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The ED’s investigation found that Khaira allegedly received and used Rs 3.82 crore from an international drug network led by Gurdev Singh and his associates.
According to the ED, Khaira helped protect drug smuggling operations, and in return, Gurdev Singh gave him Rs 3.82 crore in cash and funded his election campaigns with money from illegal drug sales.
Khaira denied these allegations, saying he was not officially informed about the house attachment and only learned about it from media reports. He called the ED’s action “character assassination” and accused the BJP of using the agency to target opposition leaders.
The ED also found that Khaira and his family spent Rs 6.61 crore between April 2014 and March 2020. Investigators identified Rs 3.82 crore as unaccounted money, based on handwritten records seized during searches in March 2021.
Khaira was arrested on November 11, 2021, under the PMLA, and a chargesheet was filed against him in a Mohali court on January 6, 2022.
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