Jammu: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday carried out simultaneous searches at multiple locations across Jammu and Kashmir, including the residence of former minister Babu Singh, in connection with a money laundering probe linked to a narco-terror case, official sources said.
The agency searched six locations in Srinagar and two in Jammu under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The investigation stems from a case first detected by the UT Police in March 2022, when a man named Mohammad Shareef Shah was arrested while attempting to deliver ₹6.9 lakh in hawala money from Kashmir to Jammu for Jatinder Singh alias Babu Singh, sources said.
According to the investigation, the seized funds were meant to finance separatist and secessionist groups in Jammu for subversive activities.
Probes further revealed an alleged nexus involving Saif Din, Farooq Ahmad Naikoo, and Mubashir Mushtaq Fafoo, with Pakistan-based operatives running a narco-terror module to channel drug proceeds into terror funding.
Naikoo allegedly operated a narco-terror network in which heroin smuggled from Pakistan was sold in India during 2021–22, generating over ₹2 crore, which was deposited in local Srinagar bank accounts. The funds were then transferred to Indian nationals in Dubai acting as money mules to conceal the source of the funds.
The laundered money was reportedly withdrawn in Dubai and routed to Hizbul Mujahideen terrorists operating from Pakistan, the ED sources said.
The Special Investigation Agency (SIA) had earlier filed a chargesheet against 12 accused, including the former minister, in the hawala case. Investigations into a cross-border narcotics syndicate involving Singh in terror financing are ongoing.
Babu Singh was arrested in April 2022 after his associate, Mohammad Shareef Shah of Kokernag, was caught in Jammu with the hawala cash.
In 2024, the SIA arrested two more persons, including a policeman, for their alleged involvement in the syndicate — Selection Grade Constable Saif-ud-din of Jammu and former sarpanch Farooq Ahmad Jungal of Uri (Baramulla) — taking the total number of accused to 17.
Earlier this year, on January 2, an SIA team also raided the houses of a policeman and a sarpanch in Jammu’s Belicharana area in connection with the terror financing probe involving Singh and Shah, seizing several electronic devices, officials added.
