The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has attached assets worth Rs 11.14 crore of former cricketers Suresh Raina and Shikhar Dhawan as part of a money-laundering probe linked to the operations of an alleged illegal betting site, official sources said on Thursday.
A provisional order has been issued under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to attach an immovable property of Dhawan worth Rs 4.5 crore and a mutual fund of Raina worth Rs 6.64 crore in the case against the online betting site named 1xBet, the sources said.
The federal agency's probe has found that both the former cricketers "knowingly" entered into endorsement agreements with foreign entities for the promotion of 1xBet and its surrogates.
The ED has questioned the two, apart from other former cricketers such as Yuvraj Singh and Robin Uthappa, actors Sonu Sood, Urvashi Rautela, Mimi Chakraborty (a former Trinamool Congress MP) and Ankush Hazra (Bengali actor), as part of this investigation.
Registered in Curacao, 1xBet is stated by the portal to be a globally-recognised bookmaker with 18 years in the betting industry.