Lucknow, Apr 8 (PTI) A PMLA court here on Tuesday remanded Samajwadi Party leader Vinay Shankar Tiwari and an executive of his company to Enforcement Directorate custody till April 11 in a money laundering case linked to an alleged bank loan fraud, the federal probe agency said.

Tiwari and Ajeet Pandey, the managing director of the Uttar Pradesh strongman's company Gangotri Enterprises Limited (GEL), were arrested by the ED on Monday from Lucknow and Maharjganj, respectively.

According to officials, Pandey is a kin of Tiwari.

A special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court has sent the two to ED remand till April 11, the probe agency said in a statement.

The arrests were followed by fresh searches carried out by the ED at 10 locations in Lucknow, Gorakhpur, Maharganj and Noida districts in Uttar Pradesh, and Mumbai on Monday.

The searches revealed that funds were "diverted" under the garb of investment and interest-free loans, and advances were given to the GEL group companies, the probe agency said.

"Some high-value properties were also transferred to benami/paper entities without any consideration when the loan account turned NPA (non-performing asset)." "Several incriminating documents were also recovered," the ED said.

The money laundering case stems from a CBI FIR where the accused have been alleged to have indulged in an alleged bank loan fraud of about Rs 750 crore between 2012 and 2016 against a consortium of banks led by the Bank of India (BoI).

The ED alleged that bank funds were "diverted and misappropriated" by siphoning off those to various related shell companies operated and controlled by the main promoter of GEL and former MLA Vinay Shankar Tiwari, and his family members and relatives, causing wrongful loss to the consortium of banks to the tune of Rs 754 crore.

It said many of his relatives are either directors, shareholders or guarantors in GEL.

Tiwari (59) is the son of a former minister and strongman from Gorakhpur late Hari Shankar Tiwari. He represented his father's assembly constituency of Chillupar in Gorakhpur on a BSP ticket before joining the SP. PTI NES NSD NSD

Money laundering probe: ED remands political leader and company executive amid alleged diversion of bank funds and benami transfers. Two individuals, including a political leader and his company's managing director, were arrested and remanded to ED custody in a PMLA case alleging diversion and misappropriation of bank funds through shell companies, interest free loans and benami transfers; searches recovered incriminating documents. The money laundering probe stems from a CBI FIR alleging an alleged bank loan fraud against a consortium of banks between 2012 and 2016, with relatives implicated as directors, shareholders or guarantors and parallel investigative steps taken under PMLA.