Popular payment platform Paytm has denied any links with the merchants that are currently under the Enforcement Directorate (ED) scanner in the Chinese loan app case.
“As a part of ongoing investigations on a specific set of merchants, the ED has sought information regarding such merchants to whom we provide payment processing solutions. It is hereby clarified that these merchants are independent entities, and none of them our group entities,” Paytm clarified on Sunday through a regulatory filing to the stock exchanges.
“We are, and will continue to, fully cooperate with the authorities, and all the directive actions are being duly complied with,” it added.
It may be noted that ED has instructed us to freeze certain amounts from the Merchant IDs (MIDs) of a specific set of merchant entities (as mentioned by the ED in their press release). It may be further noted that none of the funds which have been instructed to be frozen belong to Paytm or any of our group companies, it said.
On Friday, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) carried out search operations at six premises in Bengaluru concerning an investigation relating to what it termed a Chinese loan app case. The raids were conducted under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.
The premises of Razorpay, Cashfree Payments, Paytm Payment Services and entities “controlled” by Chinese persons were covered in the search operation, ED had said.
During the search operations, ED said it noticed that the entities raided were generating proceeds of crime through various merchant IDs and accounts held with payment gateways and banks and they were not operating from the addresses given on the Ministry of Corporate Affairs’ website or registered addresses and having fake addresses.
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