Supreme Court Stays Bail Order Of Preeti Chandra In PMLA Case

Keywords- Corruption Case , Unitech, Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002

There is significant development in the Supreme Court regarding the money laundering case against the Unitech group. This money laundering case was filed after FIRs were filed Delhi Police and The Central Bureau of investigation on the basis of complaints from the home buyers against the United group and its promoters .

Then the enforcement directorate filed a case under the prevention of money laundering act or the PMLA against the Unitech group and its ex promoters namely Sanjay and Ajay Chandra for illegally diverting more than rupees 2000 crores to Cyprus and Cayman Islands.

The enforcement directorate has further alleged that the funds collected from home buyers for housing projects were not used for the intended purposes the enforcement directorate has also accused Preeti Chandra wife of ex- promoter of Unitech Sanjay Chandra and the allegation is that Preeti Chandra’s company named Precisely Investment Private Limited received proceeds of crime as defined in the PMLA act amounting to rupees 107 crores. Precursely investments has not disclosed to the authorities the ultimate usage of the amount in question Preeti Chandra was arrested by the enforcement directorate in October of 2021 in relation to these allegations against her .

Then she applied for bail before a special PMLA court in Delhi in November of 2022 the special Court refused her bail taking note of the enormity of the transactions and the seriousness of the allegations . Then she challenged the decision of the special court in the Delhi code on the 14th June the Delhi High Court granted bail to the accused.

However advocate Zoeb Hussain who appeared in the Delhi Court on the behalf of the enforcement directorate requested that order may not be given effect to until 16th of June as the ED intends to challenge this order his contention was that the appeal will become infectious if the order is given effect to before 16th of June.

So the Delhi High court directed that the may not be given effect until Friday on the 16th of June. The enforcement directorate then approached the supreme court with an appeal against the decision of the Delhi High Court. A two judge vacation bench comprising of Justice Himakoli and Justice Rajesh Bindal heared the matter .

Additional Solicitor General Sanjay Jain while appearing for the enforcement directorate told the court that Delhi High Court had kept the bail in abeyance in anticipation of the appeal to be filed in the Supreme Court the court then issued a notice in this matter and stayed the operation of the bail order of the Delhi High Court until for the consideration.

However at the request of senior advocate Siddharth Agarwal appearing on behalf of Preeti Chandra the bench also granted liberty to her to apply for temporary bail before the competent court on health ground. The court has now listed this matter after 4 weeks till then the operation of the bail granted to Preeti Chandra in the Delhi High Court remains state.

Written by – Drishti Pandey, College – S.S.Khanna Girls Degree College, University of Allahabad, Semester – 4th an intern under legal

Admin