The Enforcement Directorate (ED) carried out searches at multiple locations linked to Vikas Garg, whose name has emerged in the high-profile Mahadev app case. A massive investigation has started on illegal gambling and financial fraud involving Mahadev app.
According to sources quoted by ZeeBiz, officials began raiding offices and residential premises of Garg early on early Wednesday morning as part of the ongoing probe.
What is the Mahadev betting app case?
The Mahadev case centres around a massive online betting and gambling racket operated through a mobile app called Mahadev. The platform allowed users to place bets on games like poker, cricket and tennis.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED), India’s top financial crime investigation agency, is probing the case, which is suspected to involve money laundering worth nearly Rs 40,000 crore.
According to investigators, the app’s operators allegedly ran the platform through a franchise-style network, sharing profits with associates while routing money through multiple fake or ‘benami’ bank accounts to hide the illegal earnings.
The ED has already filed chargesheets in the case, naming multiple accused including the main operators. Its probe has uncovered layered money laundering using benami bank accounts and involvement in stock price manipulation through promoter-controlled companies.
Earlier, the Supreme Court directed the Enforcement Directorate to trace and secure the absconding co-founder, Ravi Uppal, in the case. Uppal, fled Dubai, where he was under surveillance following an Interpol notice.
Expressing serious concerns over this evasion, the country’s top court said that investigative agencies should not be made “playthings” by white-collar criminals.
Searches were conducted u/s 17 of PMLA, 2002 in the case of M/s Titan Sea & Air Services Pvt Ltd and others in ECIR/MBZO-II/01/2024, recorded on the basis of FIR registered by CBI, EO-III, Delhi for creating fake export documents including invoices and shipping bills, to misrepresent goods as being exported to Nepal and Bangladesh, while actually selling them domestically and thereby evaded the custom duty of Rs. 190 crores.
The residential premises and business premises of Mr Vikas Garg, one of the key persons behind the evasion of custom duty of Rs. 190 crores and his employees, in whose names the entities were incorporated outside India for effecting imports and exports in their names were searched on 12.11.2025 . Incriminating evidences in relation to the imports and exports and digital devices of key persons were seized.
