senior Left MP has written a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh alleging that he has received information that a top law official of the government had a Swiss bank account, in which the officer had parked illegal money "in hundreds of crores". He wants the government to probe this information. Details of this letter have been made available to this correspondent.
The letter dated 9 August says that the MP has got information that the law officer "opened an account with Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) in a particular branch in Singapore" in 1997. "This was never disclosed," says the letter. "I am told that till 2007, a huge (amount) of foreign currency was deposited frequently in (the said) account," the letter adds.
"Suddenly in 2007, huge amount of money was transferred to the account of his daughter ... in the same branch of the same bank," says the letter.
The letter then goes on to provide information under different heads such as "Beneficiary", "Code Name", "Account handled by", "Daughter", "(Daughter's) Husband". The account code given is 569797 HL. The bank's name is given as "Union Bank of Switzerland — Branch in Singapore".
The letter also adds, "The Code Name used ... is incidentally his grandfather's name, which is a Secret Code to be used for each and every transaction."
The letter says that "this explosive and concrete information of huge black money deposit ... was available with our agencies like CBI, Enforcement Directorate, Income Tax and FIU for the past two years". The MP goes on to allege that "Our agencies were alerted by Financial Service Authority (FSA) of United Kingdom and Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), way back in 2011 in connection with these agencies' probe against the suspected money laundering activities" of the law officer's son-in-law. "But unfortunately the Indian agencies were asked not to act on this specific information by the high and mighty in our political system," the MP writes.
![]() | “This explosive and concrete information of huge black money deposit … was available with our agencies for the past two years. But unfortunately the Indian agencies were asked not to act on this specific information.” ![]() |
The letter goes on to allege that the son-in-law "came into the radar of agencies" abroad "after they suspected illegal trading activities and money laundering by him" "in late 2009". "The ... agencies found money trail to his accounts from his wife's ... account in UBS's particular branch in Singapore," the letter alleges.
The letter then says that the law officer's son-in-law "is holding an asset in the form of a house" in an Indian property owned by a 2G scam accused. The Left MP urges the Prime Minister that "this real estate deal should be taken for consideration for probe by (the) CBI team investigating 2G Scam".
The letter then goes on to say that the son-in-law's name figured "in the recent expose of 10000 persons having bank accounts in tax havens by International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ). According to ICIJ, where the information is available in public domain for the past three years ... (the son-in-law) is having accounts in Banks operating from British Virgin Islands and operating a financial service company called.... This is a common knowledge in India also. But the link could not be established that he was son-in-law of..."
The MP then raises several questions: "Here the big question is how come huge money of hundreds crores landed in the UBS's branch in Singapore in the name of ... (the law officer). Why people were paying money to (the law officer), which (was) ultimately found in foreign account? Why people are obliging him? What was the consideration? We have to find — from which sources and for what purpose millions of dollars were deposited in this particular account from 1997. This can be a tip of the iceberg. And why Indian agencies were not acting on this shocking, concrete, point blank information received...? Who blocks from them acting?"
The MP says he writes the letter in his "commitment" to fight corruption "as I did always in the past".
"I hereby request you to immediately order to our investigation agencies like CBI, Enforcement Directorate, Income Tax and Financial Intelligence Unit to get in touch with authorities of Union Bank of Switzerland and government and legal authorities in Singapore to get the details of the bank account," the MP adds.
"Again I am reiterating that I am passing this information to you while performing my duty as a Member of Parliament to protect the national interest and to fight black money and money laundering. Kindly find out if my information is alright," the letter concludes.
The Sunday Guardian has come to know that the Prime Minister has forwarded the letter to the Ministry of Law and that the MP is planning to raise the matter in Parliament.
