ED freezes TMC's Rs 440 crore bank deposits under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act as part of its ongoing investigation. (Express Photo)The Enforcement Directorate (ED) said on Wednesday that it has frozen three bank accounts of the Trinamool Congress (TMC), holding deposits worth Rs 440.42 crore, under the anti-money laundering law, following searches in an alleged funds misappropriation case.“The ED conducted search operations at five premises in and around Kolkata under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002. The premises belonged to the Carewell group of companies, which operates in the aviation sector. During the searches, balances amounting to Rs 440.42 crore lying in three HDFC Bank accounts of the All India Trinamool Congress (AITC) were frozen under Section 17(1-A) of the PMLA,” an ED spokesperson said.The searches were conducted in connection with a PMLA investigation based on an FIR lodged by the Cyber Police, Bidhannagar, West Bengal, in a case involving alleged dishonest financial dealings, unlawful collection of money, and routing of suspected funds through certain bank accounts of the AITC, the spokesperson said.Also Read | ED probes ex-TMC councillor Debraj Chakraborty’s ‘Rs 1300 crore’ propertiesAccording to the ED, its probe has revealed that around Rs 160 crore was transferred from AITC bank accounts to M/s Carewell Aviation India Pvt. Ltd. and its related entity, mostly between April 2023 and June 2026.It was further revealed that M/s Carewell Aviation India Pvt. Ltd. routed Rs 82.96 crore during 2023-2026 to another newly incorporated related entity for the purchase of an Embraer Legacy 600 aircraft and an Agusta 109 GrandNew helicopter.“A total of Rs 112 crore was used for these purchases. It was also revealed that USD 1.7 million was arranged as an unsecured loan in 2023 from a Cayman Islands-based entity to purchase the helicopter,” the spokesperson added.“These Embraer Legacy 600 aircraft and Agusta helicopter were subsequently rented out to AITC itself, even though they were purchased from the corpus of AITC. Later, substantial amounts were transferred on the pretext of aircraft usage. The above-mentioned dubious arrangement is under investigation to ascertain the actual beneficial purpose of the transactions,” the spokesperson said.