Jharkhand minister Alamgir Alam’s secretary collected commission on tenders on behalf of “some influential people”, the Enforcement Directorate told a court here on Tuesday.

It also claimed that officials of his rural development department, from “top to bottom”, were involved in an alleged illegal cash payment nexus.

The central agency on Monday arrested Sanjeev Kumar Lal, 52, and his domestic help Jahangir Alam, 42, following searches that led to the seizure ₹32.20 crore cash from a flat in the Jharkhand capital where the latter was residing.

Lal, the secretary of rural development minister and Congress leader Alamgir Alam, and Jahangir Alam were produced before the special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court of Prabhat Kumar Sharma here. The court sent them to six days of ED custody.

The seizure was made by the ED as part of a money laundering investigation linked to the rural development department.

The total seizure of cash by the ED in the case has been recorded at around ₹36.75 crore as the agency seized about ₹3 crore from another location that included ₹10.05 lakh from Lal’s place. The agency seized ₹1.50 crore from a contractor’s premises on Tuesday.

Alamgir Alam, 70, has distanced himself from the activities of Lal. Talking to reporters here on Monday the minister said Lal had earlier served with other ministers of the state government too.

During the BJP’s poll campaign in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his speeches also mentioned the cash seizure. Opposition parties have, however, claimed that the ED action was an assault against its leaders.

In its remand papers submitted in court to seek the custody of Lal and Jahangir Alam for interrogation, the ED said: “It is ascertained that Sanjeev Lal takes care of the collection of commission on behalf of some influential persons and plays a pivotal role in managing the tenders and collection of commission from engineers, also the said percentage of commission is distributed in a mechanised manner to higher-ups of the government.”

Names of “senior bureaucrats and politicians” have emerged in the case and this is being probed, the ED said.

“It is submitted that several officials, from top to bottom, of the rural development department are involved in this nexus and huge payments were usually received in cash which were later laundered which needs to be unearthed,” the ED said.