New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has frozen ₹110 crore in mule bank accounts and seized 1,200 mule credit cards after raids linked to the Indian operations of Cyprus-based “illegal” online betting platform Parimatch.
According to the ED, Parimatch gained prominence in India through aggressive marketing, including sports sponsorships and partnerships with celebrities. The platform allegedly lured investors with promises of high returns, generating over ₹3,000 crore in a single year.
The agency said the company set up Indian entities to run surrogate ads under the banners Parimatch Sports and Parimatch News, with payments made via foreign inward remittances.
Searches were conducted on August 12 at 17 locations across Mumbai, Noida, Jaipur, Surat, Madurai, Kanpur, and Hyderabad as part of a money laundering case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). The investigation stems from an FIR filed by Mumbai Police’s cyber unit, accusing parimatch.com of duping users through online betting.
The ED said the frozen funds belonged to persons and entities operating mule accounts—bank accounts used for money laundering or layering transactions. The 1,200 seized mule credit cards were found in a single location.
Alleged Modus Operandi:
- Users’ deposits were routed through mule accounts, then withdrawn in cash in Tamil Nadu and handed to hawala operators, who recharged virtual wallets of a UK-based company. These wallets were used to buy cryptocurrency in mule crypto accounts run by Parimatch agents.
- In western India, domestic money transfer agents collected funds in mule accounts and sent them to Parimatch agents via mule credit card payments.
- Payment companies whose RBI payment aggregator licence applications had been rejected allegedly acted as technology service providers, offering APIs to facilitate fund collection. Mule accounts were opened under e-commerce or payment solution company names, and user payments were collected via UPI.
- Collected money was layered and disguised as e-commerce refunds, chargebacks, and vendor payments to hide its true source and purpose.
