Ambala: The 9-day remand of Congress MLA Surendra Panwar from Sonipat in Haryana has ended today. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has produced him in Ambala court today. Surendra Panwar was arrested by ED on 20 July in a mining case. After the arrest, he was taken on a 9-day remand, which ended today.
Let us tell you that ED searched Surendra Panwar’s house on January 4. He is accused of large-scale illegal mining in the Yamunanagar area. At that time, ED had also arrested Indian National Lok Dal MLA Dilbagh Singh and his associate Kulwinder Singh. This arrest has been made given the assembly elections to be held in Haryana later this year.
Haryana Police had registered an FIR to investigate the case of illegal mining of boulders, gravel, and sand. The money laundering case is related to this. This illegal mining was taking place in Yamunanagar and surrounding districts, while the National Green Tribunal has banned it. The ED is also investigating the alleged fraud in the ‘E-Ravan’ scheme.
It is an online portal launched by the Haryana government in 2020, aimed at collecting royalty and tax and preventing tax evasion in the mining sector. According to the ED, a fund of Rs 400-500 crore has been generated from illegal mining.
Surendra Panwar defeated two-time BJP MLA Kavita Jain from Sonipat in the 2019 Haryana Assembly elections. He got 79,438 votes and won by a margin of about 30 thousand votes. Earlier he has been in the INLD and contested the 2014 elections on an INLD ticket, in which he stood third.
Surendra Panwar is considered close to former Chief Minister Bhupendra Singh Hooda. He is also responsible for organizing the main events of the Congress party in Sonipat. He is a member of Hooda’s core team, and recently he was also given the charge of state social media.