RAKESH KUMAR GUPTA Vs. UNION OF INDIA

JUDGEMENT

(1.) This writ petition challenges the order of detentiondated 23/03/1994 bearing No. F.No. 673/30/94-Cus.VIII, passed by Sh.Mahendra Prasad, Joint Secretary to the Govt. of India under section 3(1) of theConservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act,1974 (hereinafter referred to as the COREPOSA Act) by which the petitioner wasordered to be detained and kept in custody in Central Jail, Tihar, Delhi.

(2.) . Briefly the facts are that the officers of the Enforcement Directorate, DelhiZonal Office, intercepted a Maruti Car bearing registration No. DL-2C-F4598 and aMaruti Van with registration No. DL-3C-E1822 at Sonauli Border while the said twovehicles were driving to cross over to Nepal alongwith their passengers. The searchof both the vehicles was conducted under Section 36 of Foreign Exchange RegulationAct, 1973. -As a result of the search foreign exchange as per details given below wasrecovered arid seized. It was found concealed in the cavities of the vehicles. <FRM>JUDGEMENT_264_DLT57_1995Html1.htm</FRM>

(3.) . Apart from the above seized foreign exchange certain incriminating documents were recovered and seized from the cavities of the said vehicles. As thevehicles were allegedly being used for illegal trafficking of foreign exchange, thesame were also seized by the officers of the Directorate. Statements of the passengersof the vehicles, namely, S/Shri Naresh Bhardwaj Virender Chopra, Jaspal Singh,M.M. Sharma, Geeta Arora and Kumari Poonam Arora, under Section 39 of theForeign Exchange Regulation Act, 1973 were recorded. In view of some of thestatements recorded by the officers of the Directorate of Enforcement respectively,the premises of Praveen Kapur at 62, Sainik Vihar was searched on 22.1.94. 200 goldcoins 6.5 lacs of Indian currency and certain documents were seized from there.Statement of Beena Kapur wife of Praveen Kapur was recorded. Statement of O.P.Gupta, father of the present petitioner was also recorded.