ED freezes Rs 192 crore assets in money laundering case

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has frozen worth around Rs 192 crores in the form of bank balances, Fixed Deposit Receipts (FDRs), and mutual funds possessed by ZO Games Pvt Ltd, a fully owned Indian subsidiary of Winzo Pvt Ltd, during a search operation in connection with a money laundering probe. ED's Bengaluru Zonal Office conducted the searches at the office premises of the accounting firm for Winzo Pvt Ltd under Section 17 of the Prevention of MoneyLaundering Act (PMLA), 2002, on December 30, 2025.

Earlier, ED has conducted search and seizure operations at the office premises of Winzo Pvt Ltd, and residential premises of its Director on November 18, 2025. "The evidence unearthed during the Search and subsequent investigation revealed that the company was engaged in criminal activities and unscrupulous practices such as customers were made to play with BOTs, AI, algorithms, software (termed as PPP/EP/Persona) without being made aware of the fact that they are playing with BOTs, AI, algorithms and not with humans in real money games. Winzo has also prevented and limited withdrawals of monies held by the customers in the wallets of Winzo Pvt Ltd," the agency said.

"Winzo Pvt Ltd also generated POC in the form of 'Rake Commission' from the matches played by the BOTs with the real players on their Winzo App. In this manner, the company has made winnings of around Rs 177 crore from the BOTs, for the period May 2024 to August 2025 and Rs 557 crore, for the period April 2022 to December 2023. Also, the company was in possession of users' monies amounting to Rs 43 crore, even after the ban of Real Money Games by the Union Government."

So far, ED said, the investigation revealed that Winzo Pvt Ltd has generated Proceeds of Crime (POC), around Rs 802 crore. Further, a portion of the POC has been moved from India to the USA and Singapore under the guise of overseas investments, the agency said. "The funds worth USD 54 Million have been parked in their bank account in the USA (bank account held in the name of 'WINZO US Inc."), which is a shell company, since all the operations and day-to-day business activities, operation of bank accounts is done from India."