Money-laundering case: Supreme Court asks ED to respond to Punjab AAP MLA Jaswant Singh’s plea against arrest by Friday

Satya Prakash

New Delhi, June 5

The Supreme Court on Wednesday asked the Enforcement Directorate to respond to Punjab AAP MLA Jaswant Singh’s petition against his arrest as well as his application for interim bail in a money-laundering case.

A Vacation Bench led by Justice Aravind Kumar asked the ED to file its reply by Friday – the next date of hearing after the probe agency’s counsel said he needed time to respond to Singh’s plea.

On behalf of the AAP MLA, senior counsel Vikram Chaudhri and advocate Nikhil Jain said the ED was served a copy of the petition on May 30 and the agency had enough time to file its reply.

Making it clear that it will take up the matter on June 7, the Bench said no further adjournment will be granted.

On May 29, the top court had refused to grant interim bail to Singh — arrested by the ED in connection with a money-laundering probe linked to a bank fraud case — to campaign in the Lok Sabha polls. Polling for 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab took place on June 1. The Bench had said it was not inclined to grant any relief to the AAP MLA without hearing the ED.

However, it had issued notice to the ED and asked the probe agency to respond in his petition against arrest as well as his application for interim bail.

The Punjab and Haryana High Court had earlier dismissed his plea challenging his arrest, observing that there was no illegality. “We do not find any manifest illegality in the orders of remand and subsequent proceedings”, the high court had said.

An MLA from Amargarh, Jaswant Singh, contended that he was arrested in violation of Section 19 (1) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

However, the high court had pointed out that written grounds of arrest were served on him as borne out by his signatures which amounted to substantive compliance of Section 19(1).

The AAP MLA was arrested on November 6, 2023, and the written grounds of arrest were supplied to him the same day, the high court had noted.

The CBI conducted raids in May last year on premises linked to Jaswant Singh in connection with a Rs 40 crore bank fraud. In September 2022, the ED had conducted raids on several premises linked to him as part of a money-laundering probe linked to the alleged bank loan fraud. The ED had allegedly seized Rs 32 lakh in cash, mobile phones and hard drives during the raids.