CHENNAI: The DMK has moved the Madras High Court with a plea for issuing directions to the Enforcement Directorate to register cases against AIADMK ex-ministers for money laundering and hold a probe.
DMK has been alleging continued inaction due to political considerations on the part of the Enforcement Directorate over initiating money laundering proceedings under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) despite FIRs and materials revealing the generation of proceeds of crime against seven former ministers of AIADMK, including SP Velumani and P Thangamani
Nine individual writ petitions have been filed by DMK’s Rajya Sabha Member R Girirajan in this regard.
He alleged that the Central agency had committed ‘dereliction of statutory duty’ by failing to register an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) against these persons despite the existence of prima facie materials against them for having generated ‘proceeds of crime’.
Citing the FIRs registered against the former ministers Velumani, Thangamani, C Vijaya Baskar, MR Vijayabaskar, R Kamaraj, KC Veeramani, KP Anbalagan, former MLA B Sathyanarayanan alias T Nagar Sathya, and former president of Central Cooperative Bank in Salem R Elangovan by the DVAC for ‘large scale corruption’ and ‘misappropriation of public funds’, the MP said the offences committed by them constitute ‘scheduled offences’ under the PMLA.
Recalling that the High Court has recently ordered the registration of an FIR against a sitting minister (from the DMK) based on the materials shared by the ED, he said it is surprising that the ED has not taken similar action against these former ministers of AIADMK who were booked under the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA).
The petitions enlisted the predicate offence, under the PCA and IPC, coming to the fore during the probe of the DVAC against the individual leaders of AIADMK, as reflected in the FIRs of DVAC that are available on the public domain.
Stating that various complaints and materials have been placed before the competent authorities indicating large scale financial irregularities and generation of illegal wealth, the MP noted that the acts alleged against them constitute scheduled offences under the PMLA, 2002 that include offences punishable under the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and other offences under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) such criminal misconduct by a public servant, criminal conspiracy and cheating.
“The illegal gains generated through the aforesaid offences clearly constitute proceeds of crime as defined under section 2 (1) (u) of PMLA,” the MP said in the petition.
He said, despite the existence of such predicate offences and the availability of substantial materials indicating generation of proceeds of crime and submission of representations in this regard, the ED has failed to register ECIR and initiate probe under PMLA and thereby “failed to discharge its statutory duty.”
Noting that the AIADMK is currently in alliance with the ruling party in the Centre, he said the continued inaction of ED gives rise to a ‘reasonable apprehension’ that ‘political considerations’ have influenced the agency.
“Failure to register an ECIR despite the existence of prima facie materials amounts to dereliction of a statutory duty and violation of Article 21 of the Constitution,” Girirajan alleged.