ED grills alleged international drug trafficking ring kingpin Jaffer Sadiq’s wife in Chennai for 8 hours

CHENNAI: Investigators from the Enforcement Directorate grilled Tamil film producer and alleged international drug trafficking kingpin Jaffer Sadiq’s wife on Monday. Sources said the questioning lasted for nearly eight hours.

Sadiq is accused in a case registered by the Narcotics Control Bureau for allegedly acting as the mastermind in the network that was smuggling narcotics in large quantities, reportedly worth more than Rs 2,000 crore so far, to countries including Australia, New Zealand, and Malaysia.

Based on the case booked by the NCB, the ED has started a probe under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to probe the alleged laundering the money that he made from narcotics trade.

Sources told DT Next that the sleuths from the Enforcement Directorate summoned Sadiq’s wife Amina to its office in Nungambakkam where she was grilled for around eight hours.

In the second week of April, the central agency had conducted searches at more than 30 premises linked to Sadiq at Chennai and other places.

After his associates were nabbed by the Delhi unit of NCB in February, Sadiq had gone underground for nearly three weeks, before finally being arrested on March 9.

So far five people, including Sadiq and his key associate Sadhanandan, have been arrested by the NCB.

While Sadiq was on the run, the NCB team armed with a court order had broken open his house in in Santhome and searched the premises. Noted Tamil filmmaker Ameer Sulthan was also questioned by NCB for his alleged links with Sadiq.