Deny Satyendar Jain’s Lawyer to Watch His Questioning: ED Moves Delhi HC

AAP leader and Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain.

(Photo Courtesy: Facebook/Satyendar Jain) 

The Enforcement Directorate moved the Delhi High Court on Thursday, 2 June, to challenge the special court’s condition that a lawyer must be present during the interrogation of Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain, who was arrested earlier this week in connection with an alleged money laundering case, reported Bar and Bench.

A special court had last week granted ED custody of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader till 9 June.

Representing the probe agency, advocate Zoheb Hossain mentioned the plea before Acting Chief Justice Vipin Sanghi and said that the presence of Jain’s counsel will vitiate the custody granted to the ED.

The court has scheduled to hear the matter on Friday, 3 June.

The Delhi court previously allowed a lawyer to be present during Jain’s interrogation at a distance where he is able to see the proceedings but could not hear them.

Special Judge (PC Act) Geetanjali Goel said in her order, “…it is directed that during time of enquiry/interrogation from the accused one advocate of the accused shall be allowed to remain present at a safe distance where from he can see the accused but not hear him.”

The Case Against Satyendar Jain

The ED, in April this year, provisionally attached immovable properties worth Rs 4.81 crore belonging to companies allegedly linked to Jain and his relatives under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002.

The ED's probe had reportedly revealed that during the period from 2015-16, the companies owned and controlled by Jain received accommodation entries of nearly Rs 4.81 crore from shell companies against cash transferred to Kolkata-based entry operators through the "hawala route."

The agency said in a previous statement,

"Enforcement Directorate (ED), after initiating a money-laundering probe against Delhi Minister Satyendar Jain on the basis of an FIR registered by CBI, provisionally attached immovable properties worth Rs 4.81 crore belonging to his family and firms, under PMLA 2002."

(With inputs from Bar and Bench.)