New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Thursday denied bail to jailed former AAP minister Satyendar Jain in a money laundering case being probed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).
The high court, while dismissing the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader’s bail plea, said he is an influential person and may tamper with evidence.
Satyendar Jain, who was arrested on May 30 last year by the agency, had approached the high court after the trial court dismissed the bail petition in November last year.
Justice Dinesh Kumar Sharma is scheduled to pronounce the verdict later in the day.
The high court had reserved the order on March 21 after hearing arguments of the counsel for the ED and the AAP leader.
Satyendar Jain had earlier submitted that he had cooperated with the Enforcement Directorate in the investigation. The former Delhi minister also stated that the trial court Judge and ED has gravely misread and misapplied the PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) by identifying proceeds of crime solely on the basis of accommodations entries. That accommodation entries cannot itself lead to a punishable offence under PMLA, he had said in his plea to the high court.
The enforcement agency has alleged that the companies which were “beneficially owned and controlled” by Satyendar Jain had received accommodation entries amounting to ₹ 4.81 crore from the shell companies against cash transferred to Kolkata-based entry operators through a hawala route.
The case is based on a Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) complaint registered on the allegation that Satyendar Jain had acquired movable properties in the name of various persons from February 14, 2015, to May 31, 2017, which he could not satisfactorily account for.
