Special court to examine if PMLA charges cognisable

The special MPs/MLAs court where the chargesheet was filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on April 15, naming Congress MPs Sonia and Rahul Gandhi as the accused, in the National Herald matter, has sought case diaries from the agency. On the basis of the diaries, it will examine on April 25 whether the charges of money laundering stand in the case or not.

On April 15, special MPs/MLAs court judge Vishal Gogne had directed the ED's counsel to provide copies of the complaint lodged under Sections 44 and 45 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in his court, and all related documents, including the case diaries of the matter.

The judge had further directed that on April 25, the matter would be taken up for considering whether PMLA provisions stand and also whether it was a cognisable offence or not.

The judge was apprised by the ED counsel that the offence was "currently under trial" (on the basis of the original complaint of BJP leader Subramanian Swamy under Sections 403, 406 and 420 read with Section 120{B}, IPC) before a CBI court. Therefore, in the light of this fact, the special court noted that both the offences need to be tried by the same court.

However, the special MPs/MLAs court does not have the authority to get the matter transferred from the CBI court under its own jurisdiction. Hence, the ED counsel had informed the special court that he would move an application before the CBI court to transfer the matter.

As reported earlier, the ED had named Sonia and Rahul in its chargesheet on April 15, along with Overseas Congress chief Sam Pitroda and Suman Dubey.

The development had taken place just days after the anti-money laundering agency had issued notices to take possession of properties belonging to National Herald newspaper and Associated Journals Limited (AJL).

The properties had been attached by the ED in November 2023 in connection with the investigation into allegations of money laundering against Congress-controlled AJL.

The notices, seeking vacation of the premises, were affixed at properties in Delhi, Mumbai's Bandra area, and the AJL building on Bisheshwar Nath Road in Lucknow.

Among these are the iconic National Herald House on Delhi's Bahadur Shah Zafar Marg.

The ED had begun its investigation into the matter on the basis of Swamy's complaint.

Swamy had claimed a criminal conspiracy by prominent Congress leaders, including Sonia, Rahul and others, and Young Indian to allegedly launder money from the reported fraudulent takeover of properties belonging to the AJL and valued at over Rs 2,000 crore.

The National Herald is a newspaper published by the AJL and owned by Young Indian. Sonia and Rahul are majority shareholders in the latter, with 38 per cent shares allotted to each.

The Congress has called the ED action by ED as a "political vendetta" by the BJP government.

On its part, the BJP has described the matter as a "corporate controversy by the Gandhis to grab public assets".