Hasan Ali's link to gun-running, terror exposed

New Delhi: The black money case has brought the focus back on Hasan Ali, a man known as the king of money launderers in India. Ali is under investigation by the Income Tax Department for laundering upto Rs 40,000 crore.
CNN IBN unravels Hasan Ali's money trail, which is allegedly in bank accounts spanning from Switzerland to New York to Singapore and Dubai.
Hasan Ali Khan - frequently seen on the race courses of Mumbai and Pune - owns race horses, a fleet of imported luxury cars and prime property in Europe. Yet, he didn't file any income tax returns. But now, Hasan Ali was seen going in and out of Income Tax offices because he is the main accused in India's biggest ever multi-billion-dollar money laundering and tax fraud case.
Investigators have procured three letters Rogatory or Letters of Request, sent to United Kingdom, Hong Kong and United Arab Emirates on July 13, 2009, which showed how huge funds were amassed. Suspected to be proceeds of crime, the funds have been invested in various immovable and movable assets, which include deposits in various banks around the world through Money Laundering.
How much money does Hasan Ali actually have in bank accounts in tax havens? Just one account in the UBS Bank at Zurich in Switzerland has over $8 billion or Rs 36,000 crore.
The Enforcement Directorate's Case Information Report, made it clear that Hasan Ali's offences are not just related to money laundering, but also gun-running, terrorism and forgery.
Investigators said that a portion of Hasan Ali's money came from infamous international arms-dealer Adnan Khashoggi and Ali's funds in Swiss Bank were the proceeds from weapon sales.
In 1982, Hasan Ali contacted Reno Hartmann of UBS in Singapore to open a bank account in Singapore and his initial deposit was $1,500,000. After that Hartmann's senior, Dr Peter Weilly took over the handling of the account.
After Hasan Ali deposited a further $240,000,000, Weilly had the account moved from Singapore to Zurich, to directly manage Hasan Ali's portfolio. Weilly also handled arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi's portfolio in UBS and asked Hasan Ali to finance a project worth $300 million for Khashoggi in 1993.
In December 1997, the balance in Hasan Ali's UBS account touched $560 million, including the $300 million that Khashoggi had paid back.
Documents with CNN-IBN showed that many of Hasan Ali's transactions involved Kolkata-based businessman Kashinath Tapuriah. Tapuriah is the younger brother of late Priyamvada Birla.
An agreement signed in 2001 in Dubai, showed Hasan Ali and Tapuriah involved in many businesses on a 50-50 basis. The agreement also mentioned that two of Hasan Ali's companies - Autumn Holding Ltd and Payson Ltd - will pay $200 million to three companies owned by Tapuriah. The amount payable were $100 Million to Roberts, Maclean and Co Ltd; $65 million to RM Investment and Trading Company and $35 million to Roberts, Maclean Services Ltd.
In an exclusive interview to CNN-IBN in Kolkata, Tapuriah said he was introduced to Hasan Ali by two former MPs, both from Andhra Pradesh.
Tapuriah's wife Chandrika has also been slapped with Rs 20,000 crore Income Tax penalty.
It was politicians who set up Tapuriah's meeting with Hasan Ali in the early 90s. Clearly, their political connections are so powerful that hardly any action has been taken against them till now.

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