Madras High Court notifies ED about motion for action in Rs 3.99 cr seizure case

Chennai: On a motion to proceed under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002, the Madras High Court sent notice to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a case concerning the seizure of Rs 3.99 crore from passengers at Tambaram railway station on April 7.

Additionally, it filed a notice to the ED to intervene in another case pertaining to the April 4 seizure of Rs 28.5 lakh from the office of the DMK’s Tirunelveli East District Secretary.

The Special Public Prosecutor of the ED, N. Ramesh, was instructed by the Madras High Court division bench, which is made up of Justices M.S. Ramesh and Sunder Mohan, to take notice and get directions by April 24.

However, the court noted that because the offenses included in the local police’s filed report were not listed as scheduled offenses under the Act, there did not initially seem to be a basis for using the PMLA.

The division court emphasized that the Indian Penal Code’s Sections 171C, 171E, and 171F—all of which deal with bribery and undue influence in elections—as well as Section 188, which deals with disobedience to an order validly proclaimed by a public official, had been used to lodge the FIR involving the seizure of Rs 3.99 crore.

The court was subsequently told by the ED special prosecutor that Section 171 was not a scheduled offense under PMLA. The special prosecutor did, however, state that he had asked for more time to get specific directives from the ED.

The writ suit was submitted on April 7 by independent candidate C.M. Raghavan, who ran for the Tirunelveli Parliamentary seat. He requested that the ED take into consideration a submission he made.

Invoking the PMLA against BJP candidate Nainar Nagendran and Congress candidate C. Robert Bruce, he claimed in his submission that the stolen funds were intended for voter distribution.

The three train passengers who were transporting Rs 3.99 crore from Chennai to Tirunelveli were discovered to be close allies of the BJP candidate running for the Tirunelveli seat, according to A. Immanuel, the petition’s attorney.

In a similar line, he said that the Rs 28.5 lakh that was taken from a DMK office-bearer was really intended to be utilized as bribe money to get people to support the Congress candidate in the Tirunelveli district.

Immanuel, the petitioner’s attorney, maintained that proceedings against both candidates must follow the PMLA.