As many as 17 Bollywood celebrities including singers, dancers, and actors are under the Enforcement Directorate's radar for attending the wedding ceremony of the scam-accused owner of Mahadev Betting App Sourabh Chandrakar. The wedding took place in UAE in February 2023.

 

 

 

According to the ED, Sourabh spent Rs 200 crore on his wedding. A major chunk of this amount went to Bollywood celebrities who attended and performed at the Dubai wedding. As they could now be summoned by the ED for interrogation, the names of Tiger Shroff, Sunny Leone, singer Neha Kakkar have come up as top attendees.

 

This comes as the ED is investigating Rs 5,000 crore money laundering charge against Sourabh Chandrakar and his business partner Ravi Uppal who run the online gambling app from Dubai.

 

 

1. Mahadev Online Betting application is a game app on which around a million individuals have placed bets in the last year. The app is being operated from around 30 centres. But the promoters are now based in Dubai where betting is legal.

 

2. Hailing from Chhattisgarh, Sorabh Chandrakar and Ravi Uppal are key accused in the money laundering case.

 

3. According to ED sources, Chandrakar threw another party in Dubai on September 18, 2022 in which Bollywood stars have been paid Rs 40 crore to attend that party at a seven-star luxury hotel.

 

 

 

4. At the February wedding, private jets were hired to take family members to Dubai from Nagpur. Bollywood celebrities, wedding planners, dancers, decorators were all flown from Mumbai to Dubai. The list of performers, as reported, includes Atif Aslam, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Ali Asgar, Vishal Dadlani, Elli AvrRam, Bharti Singh, Bhagyashree, Kriti Kharbanda, Nushrratt Bharuccha, Krushna Abhishek among others.

 

5. Investigation into Mahadev Online Betting started in December last year. The Bollywood connection has only come to the fore now.

 

6. Some of the Bollywood personalities featured in YouTube videos promoting the Mahadev Online Book app.

 

7. ED has not officially disclosed the names of the Bollywood personalities who were featured on the advertisements of the app. But a leading comic, a character artiste, a top B-rung male star, a female comic star apparently received payment from the platform.

 

8. On Friday, the ED seized assets worth ₹417 crore in connection with the case from Bhopal, Mumbai and Kolkata.

 

9. The modus operandi of the betting site was to operate under various names in India since betting is banned.