ED searches 26 premises linked to PFI, outfit calls move politically motivated

New Delhi, Dec 04: The Enforcement Directorate carried out searches at 26 premises linked to the Popular Front of India (PFI), including those belonging to its chairman, O M Abdul Salam and Kerala chief Nasarudheen Elamarom in connection with a money laundering probe.

The ED is probing the PFI's financial link on charges of fuelling the anti-citizenship Amendment Act protests in the country. It is also probing the financial links between the PFI and Bhim Army chief, Chandrasekhar Azad.

The PFI called the raids as politically motivated and added that such actions happen when the government in power comes under pressure of popular anger and it wants to divert national attention from it through gimmick. The PFI was referring to the ongoing protests by the farmers.

The ED said that it had conducted searches in Chennai, Tenkasi and Madurai (Tamil Nadu), Bengaluru, Darbhanga and Purnea (Bihar), Lucknow and Barabanki (Uttar Pradesh), Aurangabad in Maharashtra, Kolkata and Murshidabad (West Bengal), Jaipur, Shaheen Bagh area in Delhi and in Kochi, Malappuram, Kozhikode and Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala.

Raids were conducted at the residences of Sala, Elamarom, Abdul Rehman, P Koya and Karamana Ashraf in Kerala. Sources say that during the searches, pen drives, documents, books and laptops were seized.

"The Modi government has always used national agencies against its political opponents and to crush dissent in the country to the point that the credibility of these agencies has come under question," the PFI said in a statement.