JK Cricket Assn Case: High Court quashes ED chargesheets against ex-CM Farooq Abdullah, others
Our Correspondent
Srinagar, August 14
The Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh High Court on Wednesday quashed chargesheets filed by Enforcement Directorate (ED) against National Conference president and former J&K Chief Minister Farooq Abdullah and others in connection with money laundering probe linked to irregularities in the Jammu and Kashmir Cricket Association (JKCA).
A single Bench order passed by Justice Sanjeev Kumar also quashed the charges framed by a Srinagar Court in the case in 2020.
What court said
“For the foregoing reasons, I find merit in the plea of the counsel for the petitioner and regret my inability to accept the argument of Additional Solicitor General of India, which he vehemently projected before me. This petition is, accordingly, allowed. The complaint, chargesheet and charges framed by the designated Special Court (Principal Sessions Court, Srinagar) vide order dated March 18, 2020 are quashed,” the court said in the order on Wednesday.
The ED had named National Conference chief Abdullah, Ahsan Ahmad Mirza, former treasurer of the JKCA, Mir Manzoor Gazanffer, another ex-treasurer of the JKCA, and some others as accused in the chargesheet.
Ahsan Ahmad Mirza, who is a petitioner in the case, had moved the High Court seeking its quashing. Abdullah was among those named in the supplementary chargesheet in 2022.
Advocate Shariq J Reyaz, representing Mirza and Gazanffer in the case, on Wednesday said: “The chargesheet filed by the ED has been quashed by the J&K High Court.”
“For the foregoing reasons, I find merit in the plea of the counsel for the petitioner and regret my inability to accept the argument of Additional Solicitor General of India, which he vehemently projected before me. This petition is, accordingly, allowed. The complaint, chargesheet and charges framed by the designated Special Court (Principal Sessions Court, Srinagar) vide order dated March 18, 2020 are quashed,” the court said in the order on Wednesday.
It, however, said: “It will remain open to the Enforcement Director to register ECIR afresh and launch prosecution against the petitioner under Section 3 of the PMLA if the Court of Chief Judicial Magistrate, Srinagar, frames charges for offence/offences, which are specifically mentioned in the schedule of the PMLA.”
The court ruled that “the Enforcement Directorate cannot be allowed to assume jurisdiction of the competent court of criminal jurisdiction and arrived at conclusions different from those arrived at by the CBI, which has investigated the matter and presented the chargesheet before the CJM, Srinagar.”
Mirza was arrested by the ED in September, 2019. A chargesheet was filed against him in November that year and the trial in that complaint is going on. The ED’s case is based on a 2018 chargesheet filed by the CBI against the same accused.
Abdullah too has been questioned by the agency in the case.
The CBI chargesheet filed against Abdullah, Mirza, Gazanffer and former accountants Bashir Ahmad Misgar and Gulzar Ahmad Beigh alleged “misappropriation of JKCA funds amounting to ~43.69 crore” from grants given by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to promote the sport in the erstwhile state between 2002 and 2011.
The ED had earlier said its probe found that the JKCA received ~94.06 crore from the BCCI in three different bank accounts during financial years 2005-06 to 2011-12 (up to December 2011).
It had alleged that several other bank accounts were opened in the name of the JKCA into which the funds were transferred. The bank accounts along with the existing bank accounts were later used for laundering JKCA funds. (With PTI inputs)
