The Enforcement Directorate has provisionally attached assets worth about Rs 31.70 crore and filed a supplementary charge sheet against 17 people in the Chhattisgarh District Mineral Foundation (DMF) fund case. The attachment order was issued on October 29, and the charge sheet was filed on October 30 before the special PMLA court in Raipur, according to IANS.
What the ED alleges
The ED’s case centres on the District Mineral Foundation Trust (DMFT), a fund meant to finance education, health, drinking water and roads in areas affected by mining. Investigators allege a syndicate of public servants, agents and liaisons manipulated procurement and payments routed through the Chhattisgarh Rajya Beej Evam Krishi Vikas Nigam, the state’s seed and agriculture development corporation, to steer supply contracts toward favoured firms at inflated costs.
According to Patrika, agents and liaisons allegedly collected commissions of 25 to 50 percent of the base value of purchase orders issued to rate-contract holders, taken partly in cash and partly through banking channels before being layered through multiple accounts and entities. The ED has pegged proceeds of crime in this part of the case at about Rs 35 crore, against which the Rs 31.70 crore attachment was made.
Who is named in the charge sheet
Satpal Singh Chabda is described by the ED as one of the syndicate’s main liaisons and financial coordinators. He was arrested on September 1 under Section 19 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), per Oquilia‘s reporting of the case. Mandip Chawla is named among the 17 accused in the charge sheet, though neither Oquilia nor Patrika’s report detail his specific role.
Suspended IAS officer Ranu Sahu, the former Korba district collector, is also among the accused in the wider DMF probe. She was arrested by the ED in October 2024 over an earlier phase of the same case; the fresh charge sheet does not reflect a new arrest in her case, only a continuation of proceedings against the broader group of 17.
How the case got here
The ED’s probe is built on an Enforcement Case Information Report that clubs FIRs originally registered by Chhattisgarh’s Anti-Corruption Bureau and Economic Offences Wing in Raipur, along with a separate FIR from Kanker district police, under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988, and relevant sections of the penal code, per Patrika’s report.
Haribhoomi’s report on the October attachment corroborates the Rs 31.70 crore figure and the 17-accused charge sheet, placing this as the latest in a series of ED actions on Chhattisgarh’s DMF funds that began with an earlier Rs 21.47 crore attachment in December 2024.
How the DMF probe has grown since 2024
The case dates back to October 2024, when the ED arrested Ranu Sahu, then the Korba district collector, and fellow officer Maya Varier. The ED’s own release at the time alleged that Sahu’s associates fraudulently secured DMF contracts routed through an NGO, Udgam Seva Samiti, and that one associate, Manoj Kumar Dwivedi, paid commissions of up to 42 percent to win DMF work, a claim reported by Free Press Journal and corroborated by Organiser and Deccan Herald at the time.
Two months later, in December 2024, the ED attached roughly Rs 21.47 crore of assets linked to Sahu and Varier, its first major attachment in the case. By September 2025, the ED’s own account of the probe listed 16 accused, with three under arrest. The October 2026 charge sheet raises that to 17 accused and four arrests, with Chabda’s September 2026 arrest the most recent addition, and the Rs 31.70 crore order the largest single attachment in the case so far.
What happens next
A provisional attachment under the PMLA must still be confirmed by the law’s Adjudicating Authority before it becomes final. Four people have been arrested in the case so far, and the ED has said investigation into the remaining accused, including other government servants and agents, is continuing.
All individuals named in this report are accused in an ongoing investigation and are presumed innocent unless proven guilty before a court of law.
Frequently asked questions
What is the District Mineral Foundation (DMF) fund?
It is a trust set up under the Mines and Minerals (Development and Regulation) Act to channel a share of mining royalties into education, health, drinking water and infrastructure for communities in mining-affected districts.
What does a “provisional attachment” under the PMLA mean?
It is a temporary order freezing a suspect’s assets while an investigation continues. It must later be confirmed by the PMLA’s Adjudicating Authority, or the assets are released back to the owner.
Has anyone been convicted in this case?
No. The charge sheet filed on October 30 is a prosecution complaint, not a verdict. All 17 named individuals are accused and are presumed innocent unless a court finds otherwise.
Leave a Reply