IMPORTANT POINT
Order granting bail must demonstrate application of mind as to why applicant has been granted or denied privilege of bail.

ORDER

This Criminal Petition, under Sections 437 and 439 of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 (for short, ‘CrPC’), is filed seeking to enlarge the petitioner/A.4 on bail in case information report in F.No.ECIR/HYZO/03/2022 of Directorate of Enforcement, Hyderabad Zonal Office.

2. A case in crime No.29 of 2021of C.I.D. p.s., A.P., Amarvathi, Mangalagiri has been registered for the offences punishable under Sections 166, 167, 418, 420, 465, 468, 471, 409, 201, 109 read with 120B of the Indian Penal Code, 1860 (for short, ‘IPC’) and 13 (2) read with 13 (1) (d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. based on a report lodged by the Chairman of Andhra Pradesh State Skill Development Corporation, Andhra Pradesh (for short, ‘APSSDC’). The petitioner herein is arrayed as A.20 in the said crime. The aforesaid FIR has been registered against one Ghanta Subba Rao, the then Special Secretary of Government, Skill Development, Entrepreneurship and Innovation Department, M/s. Siemens Industry Software India Private Limited (SISW), M/s. Design Tech System Private Limited (DTSPL) and others for allegedly swindling of money invested by the Government in a dubious manner. According to the said FIR, APSSDC entered into a Memorandum of Association (MoA) with SIEMENS (combination of SISW and DTSPL), to impart Hi-end technology training to the trainers of APSSDC, pursuant to which DTSPL had to provide training software development including various sub modules designed for the high-end software for advanced manufacturing CAD/CAM, and the MoA does not contemplate any sub contract. As part of the SIEMENS project, 6 clusters at a cost of Rs.546.84 crores (per cluster) were to be formed in which 90% of the total project cost i.e. Rs.2951.00 crores was supposed to be borne by M/s. SISW and M/s. DTSPL, and the remaining 10% i.e. Rs.330.00 crores was supposed to be borne by the Government. The total project cost for establishing 6 SIEMENS clusters amount to Rs.3281.40 crores.

3. Since Sections 120B, 418, 420, 471 IPC and Section 13 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 are scheduled offences under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (for short, ‘PMLA’), investigation was initiated under the aforesaid case information report dated 07.01.2022. The petitioner herein is arrayed as A.4 in the said case information report. In the course of investigation, the respondent recorded statements of various persons, collected documents/information from agencies, banks, entities, etc. and analyzed bank accounts, and it revealed many discrepancies including diversion of APSSDC funds through various shell companies; the vendors from whom purchases were shown to have been made were pre-decided in advance; major portion of funds were transferred to Skillar Enterprise India Private Limited (SEPL) which was incorporated post ‘tri party agreement’ signed among M/s. DTSPL, SISW and APSSDC for implementation of SIEMENS project; major portion of the funds received from the government in the account of Execution Partner M/s. DTSPL was diverted to this newly opened entity SEPL, which has no past experience to execute the scope of work, and SEPL was used for diversion of Government funds which was meant for SIEMENS project. It has been further revealed that major portion of funds were diverted by SEPL to suspicious entities under the guise of supply of software/hardware/materials/ services, which, in reality, was not done. The purpose of diversion of funds was to generate cash and thereby siphon off money from the system without utilizing the same for the SIEMENS project for which the Government sanctioned the funds. On examination of data and analysis of bank account statements revealed that out of the funds received by SEPL from APSSDC through DTSPL, Rs.56.00 crores (approx..) was transferred by SEPL to an entity Allied Computers International Asia Limited (ACI), and the said amount was diverted through a web of shell entities by way of layered transactions.