Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi (MS)
New Delhi, Nov 15: The plea that was submitted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) to the Supreme Court questioning the bail granted to D K Shivakumar by the Delhi high court was quashed on Friday.
The contention by Tushar Mehta, the solicitor general that Rs 12 crore of laundered money was found with D K Shivakumar was rejected by the SC.
Justice R F Nariman and S Ravindra Bhat, the SC bench which looked into this appeal said, "This is the not the way you treat citizens of this country." The court took a strong view on Section 45 of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) being resurrected. This was contested by lawyers appearing for Shivakumar, A M Singhvi and Mukul Rohatgi. This was when they said that the investigating agency has resurrected the stringent Section 45, which was quashed way back in 2017 for being violating the right of a person's liberty.
In 2017, a Supreme Court bench by Justice Nariman had struck down section 45 of PMLA calling it a drastic provision. Section 5 states that no accused can be granted bail unless prosecutor gets an opportunity to oppose and if the prosecutor chooses to oppose it, the court has to be convinced that he was not guilty of the crime.