New Delhi: Tamil Nadu minister V Senthil Balaji Thursday contended before the Supreme Court that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials are not the police officers while questioning ED’s power to seek his custodial interrogation, and also stressed that there alleged abuse of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in the entire country.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the minister and his wife Megala, vehemently argued before the bench comprising justices A S Bopanna and M M Sundresh that ED officials are not police officers and it has been held in the Vijay Mandal Choudhary judgment delivered last year by the apex court.
Sibal cited similar provisions of the Customs Act and the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FERA) and argued that investigating officers are not allowed to get the police custody of an accused under them. Sibal referred to the alleged abuse of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in the entire country.
At this juncture of the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the ED, said there is no need to make political statements and “let us confine ourselves to facts and law”. Sibal emphasized that under the PMLA, the accused is arrested for the predicate offence, therefore it lacks the power to seek custody of the accused. He said ED officers must produce the accused to the police.
The top court will continue to hear the matter on August 2. Megala’s plea challenged the validity of the Madras High Court's orders of July 14 and July 4, dismissing her habeas corpus petition as not maintainable. A single-judge bench on July 14 concurred with the view of one of the judges on the division bench allowing the ED to take him into custody.
The plea said: “Not being a ‘police officer’, there is no law that confers powers on the ED to seek police custody of the accused. There is no provision in the PMLA that confers powers to the ED to seek an order of remand to its own custody in the same manner as ‘an officer in charge of a police station’ or ‘a police officer making the investigation’ exercises on production before a Magistrate under section 167 CrPC post arrest”.
The plea, filed through advocate Amit Anand Tiwari, argued that the high court erred to hold that ED has the right to investigate further after making arrest under Section 19 of PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) and then seeking custody for further investigation is permissible.
