New Delhi: The Supreme Court is slated to hear Monday a plea filed by the Trinamool Congress and its Rajya Sabha member Dola Sen challenging the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) decision to freeze three of the party’s bank accounts in connection with an alleged money laundering probe.
As per the causelist uploaded on the apex court’s official website, the special leave petition (SLP) is listed before a Bench of Justices M.M. Sundresh and Prasanna B. Varale.
The petition challenges the July 20 order of the Calcutta High Court refusing to grant interim relief against the ED’s freezing order issued under Section 17(1-A) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The controversy relates to three HDFC Bank accounts of the Trinamool Congress on which the ED imposed debit restrictions after initiating an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) June 23 based on a predicate FIR registered by the Cyber Crime Police Station, Bidhannagar.
Refusing interim relief, a single-judge Bench of Justice Krishna Rao of the Calcutta High Court had held that the court did not find any prima facie case warranting interference at the interim stage.
“This court did not find any prima facie case and balance of convenience and inconvenience in favour of the petitioners. In view of the above, interim order as prayed for by the petitioners is refused,” the bench had said.
The High Court observed that the ED had analysed the party’s bank accounts and found “substantial transfers of funds to various entities”, including the Carewell group, and held that the legality of those transactions could not be examined at the interim stage.
“At the stage of grant of interim order, it is not possible for the court to adjudge whether the transfer is legal or otherwise. The petitioners will get an opportunity to place all grievances before the Adjudicating Authority,” the High Court said.
Justice Rao also recorded that the ED had frozen only six bank accounts, while the party continued to operate 36 other accounts containing deposits of over Rs 164 crore.
At the same time, the High Court rejected the ED’s preliminary objection on maintainability, holding that the writ petition had been validly instituted through an authorised representative of the party. It also held that the existence of an alternative statutory remedy did not bar the High Court from examining allegations of arbitrariness in the initiation of the ECIR proceedings.
The ED had imposed the restrictions after detecting allegedly suspicious transactions amounting to Rs 164 crore. Before the ED’s action, the accounts had already been subjected to debit restrictions by the bank on the instructions of the West Bengal Police. The freezing of the accounts followed a complaint alleging that funds arising from illegal activities, including misuse of influence, dishonest financial dealings and suspected unlawful collection of money, had been routed through the accounts.
Based on the complaint, the Cyber Crime Police registered an FIR under provisions of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita and the Information Technology Act, following which the ED registered an ECIR under the PMLA. The Trinamool Congress has contended that the freezing action was mechanical, arbitrary and undertaken without identifying or segregating any specific proceeds of crime, while also alleging that the action formed part of a series of coercive measures initiated against the party following the political change in West Bengal.
