India’s Directorate of Enforcement seized 77.6 bitcoins linked to E-nuggets. It is estimated that they are worth approximately $1.5 million. These assets were moved from WazirX into Binance. 173 million rupees were also taken by the agency.
India’s Directorate of Enforcement, a law enforcement agency investigating financial crimes, has frozen cryptocurrencies in the amount of 128 million rupees ($1.5million).
The 77.6 Bitcoins were purchased on WazirX and sent to Binance
ED froze 77.6 Bitcoins under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. This was part of an ongoing investigation into Aamir Kan and other people connected to E-nuggets gaming app. The bitcoins that were frozen were originally purchased on WazirX, then transferred to Binance.
The investigation was led by the Park Street police of Kolkata. It has been ongoing since February 15, 20,21 according to the announcement. This announcement also mentions that Nesar Ahmed Khan Khan, Aamir Khan’s partner, had launched E-nuggets to defraud users. It reads:
“After obtaining a large amount of money from public, all of sudden withdrawals from said app were stopped on one pretext/or another,” and continues, “Thereafter all data including profile information was deleted from said app servers.”
During its investigation, ED found that the accused was using crypto exchanges to transfer funds overseas. Sima Naskar was the person who opened WazirX account. In August, the ED had frozen its bank accounts and it was used to buy cryptocurrencies which were then transferred to Binance. The notice from the ED stated that crypto relating these transfers and kept on Binance had been frozen.
Aamir Khan had previously 173.2 million rupees, which is approximately. $2.1 Million) in cash that was seized from Aamir Khan’s property during a search.
WazirX informed The Block that after the publication of the story, it had been cooperating with ED and provided all relevant facts, information and documents the investigators needed.
Binance hadn’t responded to a request of comment at the time of publication.
