The Directorate of Enforcement (ED) has filed a prosecution complaint before a special PMLA court in Guwahati against former officials of the National Project Construction Corporation (NPCC) and private contractors in connection with an alleged bribery and money laundering case involving border infrastructure contracts worth approximately ₹60.30 crore. According to an official statement, those named in the complaint include Rakesh Mohan Kotwal, former Zonal Manager (Northeast Region) of NPCC Ltd., Latiful Pasha, officer-in-charge of the Jalpaiguri Project Office, and Anish Baid and Binod Singhi, directors of M/s Shree Gautam Construction Company Limited, among others.
The case relates to contracts awarded by NPCC on behalf of the Border Security Force (BSF) for the construction of nine Border Outposts along the Indo-Bangladesh border. The ED initiated its investigation based on an FIR registered by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which had earlier filed a chargesheet in November 2021 against nine accused under provisions of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and the Prevention of Corruption Act. Investigations revealed that Kotwal and Pasha allegedly demanded a bribe of around ₹33 lakh—later negotiated to ₹30 lakh—from a contractor for clearing pending bills amounting to approximately ₹2.24 crore.
The probe further found that about ₹25 lakh was routed through hawala channels across Silchar, Guwahati, and Delhi. A portion of the money was also transferred via bank accounts to a distributor firm before being converted into cash and delivered in Delhi, where the CBI intercepted the transaction and recovered the amount in July 2019. Additionally, ₹15 lakh, believed to be proceeds of crime, was recovered from a showroom in Silchar, where it had reportedly been stored on the instructions of one of the accused.The ED stated that evidence suggests similar demands for bribes may have been made from other contractors as well. Further investigation in the case is currently ongoing.