A Division Bench of the Supreme Court dismissed plea of Tamil Nadu Chief Minister V. Senthil Balaji against arrest in cash-for-jobs scam and allowed Enforcement Directorate (ED), interrogation in the money laundering case.
S. Megala, wife of V Senthil Kumar, before the Supreme Court challenged the validity of the Madras High Court’s orders of July 14 and July 4, dismissing her habeas corpus petition as not maintainable. The Madras High Court allowed the ED to take custody of the Minister.
The Counsels for the petitioner, Kapil Sibal and Mukul Rohatgi, Senior Advocates contended that there is no power vested under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA) to seek custody in favour of an authorized officer. Such an authorized officer is not a police officer and therefore, Section 167(2) of the Code of Criminal Procedure, 1973 with particular reference to a remand in his favour, is not available.
The Counsels also contended that after the completion of 24 hours from the arrest, there cannot be further custody in favour of an officer. Being a beneficial legislation, non-compliance of Section 41A of the CrPC, 1973 would vitiate the orders of remand and the outer limit of 15 days of custody to the police from the date of arrest has worked itself out. Therefore, no Court can extend it under any circumstance.
Tushar Mehta, Solicitor General, while repelling the contentions raised, made further submissions that the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA) is a special Act having its own distinct characteristics. It is a sui generis legislation. It provides for an elaborate mechanism for a thorough investigation through search, seizure and arrest. Section 65 of the PMLA, 2002 clearly speaks of the overriding effect over the CrPC, 1973. There is due compliance of Section 19 of the PMLA, 2002.
Dismissing the plea of V. Senthil Kumar the Bench of Justices AS Bopanna and M M Sundresh observed that “In the case on hand, there is no custody in favour of the respondents, a fact even acknowledged by the appellant earlier through the arguments of his advocates. The Solicitor General is right in his submission that apart from the fact that the word “custody” is different from “detention”, it can only be physical. As pointed out by him even the High Court has observed that the appellant continues to be in judicial custody.”
“The Registry is directed to place the matter before the Chief Justice of India for appropriate orders to decide the larger issue of the actual import of Section 167(2) of the CrPC, 1973 as to whether the 15 days period of custody in favour of the police should be only within the first 15 days of remand or spanning over the entire period of investigation – 60 or 90 days, as the case may be, as a whole” the Bench concluded
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