RAMCHAND KARUNAKARAN Vs. DIRECTORATE OF ENFORCEMENT

JUDGEMENT

(1.) The applicant is seeking his release on bail in relation to an offence under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002.

(2.) Heard the learned senior counsel Mr.AHH Ponda for the applicant and Mr.Venegaonkar for the Directorate of Enforcement, Mumbai. ECIR bearing No.ECIR/MBZO- 1/2/2019 was registered by the Directorate of Enforcement, Mumbai. The Assistant Directorate, PMLA filed a complaint in the designated Court for the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 under Sections 44 and 45 of the PMLA for commission of the offence of Money Laundering as defined under Sections 3 and punishable under Section 4 of the said Act. On 31st August 2019, the designated Court took cognizance of the complaint and issued summons to the accused persons. The case was then numbered as Case No.6 of 2019. The applicant is one of the accused who has been alleged to have indulged in money laundering according to the said complaint.

(3.) Learned counsel Shri Ponda appearing for the complainant would urge that the applicant is a sexagenarian and is a qualified Civil Engineer who had joined the Infrastructure Leasing and Financial Services Ltd (hereinafter referred to as 'IL&FS'). He was sent to deputation to the IL&FS Transportation Networks Limited (ITNL). He came to be appointed as Managing Director of ITNL and continued on the said post till he was asked to tender his resignation in October 2018. The learned counsel would submit that on an ECIR numbered above, being registered on 19th February 2019, the applicant was summoned by Enforcement Directorate for investigation and he co-operated with the investigation throughout. The applicant was arrested on 19 th June 2019 and the Enforcement Directorate was granted his custody. From 20th June 2019, he was remanded to judicial custody and since then, is incarcerated. The submission of Mr.Ponda is to the effect that on perusal of the complaint, the alleged case of ED is that the Committee of Directors (COD) of IFIN in connivance with promoters of groups sanctioned loans to several group companies which have been named in the complaint, at the time when these groups were under financial stress and unable to discharge their outstanding loans and the new loans were sanctioned to repay their earlier loans and to be utilized by the groups, otherwise then, as mentioned in the Credit Approval Memorandum thereby committing schedule offences. It is alleged that the COD did so in order to maintain the credentials of IFIN and in lieu to continue to receive high remuneration. Thus, according to him, the COD of IFIN which had the sole authority to approve all loan proposals but the COD included four accused persons i.e. Ravi Parthasarthy, Ramesh Bawa, Hari Sankaran and Arun Saha. According to Shri Ponda, the applicant was not a member of COD of IFIN and thus, no accusations can be attributed to him. Further, according to him, the name of the applicant is not included in the Top Management, which is not the case as regards the other accused persons. According to him, the applicant was only a member of United Approval Framework (UAF) of IFIN Infrastructure Projects and the role of the applicant was limited to review of the infrastructure projects which, in any case, was not binding on IFIN. Further, he is not recipient of any monies from IFIN. The submission, therefore, is during his entire tenure with IL&FS, the applicant remained merely as its employee. He came to be deputed to ITNL being employee of IL&FS, which raised invoices over ITNL towards deputation cost and this deputation cost was paid to IL&FS and not to the applicant who received his salary from IL&FS and Performance Related Perquisites (PRP) from ITNL. According to Shri Ponda, the applicant was not recipient of any PRP, deputation cost, commission and sitting fees through IFIN during his entire tenure. The applicant is said to have been received salary from IL&FS and also his superannuation dues including the Provident Fund, Gratuity which was deposited into a fund in LIC has not been released in his favour. Thus, according to Shri Ponda, the offence of Money laundering which has been attributed in the complaint do not implicate him and he has no concern with IFIN.