NEW DELHI, Feb 3: An amount of ₹ 18,000 crores have been returned to banks by fugitive tycoons Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi and Mehul Choksi, the centre told the Supreme Court which is hearing a batch of petitions challenging the wide scope of powers given to the Enforcement Directorate in connection to money laundering cases.
In India, 4,700 money laundering cases are being investigated by the Enforcement Directorate and the total proceeds of crimes pending before the court amounts to ₹ 67,000 crore, the Centre said.
Appearing for the Centre, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta cited the figures to reflect how a large sum of money is still stuck and not crossing recovery stage due to the protection being granted by courts. “Some of the people who have left the country duping thousands of crores are getting protection of the courts. Presently about ₹ 67000 crores is held up by the Courts by granting non-coercive actions,” he said.
Over the last weeks, several senior advocates, including Kapil Sibal, Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Mukul Rohatgi have made submissions in the Supreme Court pointing to potential misuse of the recent amendments to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
The law has been criticised over a range of issues — stringent bail conditions, non-communication of grounds of arrest, arrest of persons without supply of ECIR (parallel to a First Information Report filed by the police), the broadening of the definition of money laundering, proceeds of crime, and statements given by accused during investigation made admissible as evidence during trial.
A very small number of cases are being taken up for investigation under the PMLA in India, compared to the situation abroad, the Centre told a bench of Justices AM Khanwilkar, Dinesh Maheshwari and CT Ravikumar.
As examples, the Centre cited the UK, where 7,900 cases have been filed under the Money Laundering Act in a year, the US (1,532), China (4,691), Austria (1,036), Hong Kong (1,823), Belgium (1,862) and Russia (2,764).
In India, the number of cases taken up for investigation each year in the last 5 years varies from 111 cases in 2015-16 to 981 in 2020-21, the Centre said. Over the last five years (2016-17 to 2020-21), 33 lakh FIRs have been filed for such offences. But only 2,086 cases were taken up for investigation, the Centre said.
(Manas Dasgupta)
