ED files prosecution complaint against Nowhera Shaik

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday filed a prosecution complaint against the founder of Heera Group of companies Nowhera Shaik and others in Ponzi scheme fraud case.

The ED has initiated an investigation under Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) based on FIRs registered by Central Crime Station (CCS), Hyderabad, Karnataka CID and Andhra Pradesh police against Nowhera Shaik, Heera Group of companies and others.

During the investigation, it was revealed that Nowhera Shaik hatched a conspiracy and lured innocent people to deposit their savings with her for ‘profit’ sharing rather than interest, which is not allowed in Islam.

She incorporated Heera Group of companies and initially promptly paid the monthly assured so-called profit to win the trust of the people. Later, by engaging a network of marketing executives and direct selling agents working on a commission basis, she collected deposits to the tune of Rs 5,600 crore from around 1,72,000 investors across the country by making false promises of paying a



high rate of returns i.e. three per cent per month (36 per cent to 40 per cent per year).

For this fraud, she opened around 250 accounts in various banks across the country and eight accounts in UAE and Saudi Arabia. They diverted the depositor’s amounts to their personal accounts for wrongful gain and amassed huge movable and immovable assets.

Nowhera Shaik and Heera Group of companies did not possess any valid permission either under the Banking Regulation Act or from RBI or from any other government agency such as SEBI for collecting deposits.

The generated proceeds of crime were in the form of movable and immovable properties.

In 2019, the ED attached assets worth Rs 299.99 crore of Nowhera Shaik, Heera Group of companies and others in different States under PMLA. It has now filed the first prosecution complaint against 28 accused including Nowhera before the court for awarding punishment to them and confiscation of the attached properties under PMLA.