Sex racket comes to light in Ludhiana City Centre scam

Ludhiana, Sep 30 (UNI) The Punjab Vigilance Bureau has unearthed a sex racket involving Indian and foreign call girls during the course of its investigations in the multi crore Ludhiana City Centre scam in which former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh is amongst the 18 alleged accused.

This startling revealation follows close on the heals of the arrest of former Additional Advocate General Harpreet Singh Sandhu by the Bureau on Friday last. Sandhu who is currently in police custody was arrested on charges of taking kickbacks in the City Centre scam and in the intranet scam, which was hushed up during Capt Singh's tenure after fingers were pointed at his son, Raninder Singh.

Giving details Bureau DIG Sharad Chauhan and SSP Kanwarjit Singh Sandhu said here today that Sandhu had contacts with about 25 call girls, including foreigners. These girls were supplied to various people, they said while refusing to disclose any names at this juncture.

The two officers revealed that former Ludhiana SSP A S Rai is also being summoned as he had accompanied Sandhu to Delhi on a number of occasions when the intranet scam came to light during Capt Singh's tenure. The two had gone to meet one R S Gill with the motive to hush up the intranet scam, which is being reinvestigated by the Vigilance, they added.

The two officers further revealed that Capt Singh and his family members had sent 13 sealed bags containing Rs 25 crore to a foreign country through hawala transactions using a Hoshiarpur based money transaction company. The joint owners of this company--Rakesh Chopra and Rajesh Chopra are still at large.

Dr Chauhan claimed that the Vigilance Bureau was in the process of bringing three more multi crore scams that took place during Capt Singh's term before the public very soon.

The City Centre scam had come to light in November last year and after a lot of hue and cry from the then opposition Shiromani Akali Dal(SAD), Capt Singh had ordered an inquiry by the Vigilance Bureau.

When the SAD-BJP came to power in March this year, a case against Capt Singh, his then ministerial colleague Chaudhary Jagjit Singh, Ludhiana Improvement Trust former Chaiman P S Sibia and 15 others was registered and they were accused of causing losses running into crores to the state exchequer.

Delhi based Today Homes and Infrastarture had been assigned the task of executing this ultra modern housing and commercial project, which was said to be the best of its kind in Asia. Capt Singh and a number of others accused in the scam are currently on bail.

UNI