In a reprieve for Karti Chidambaram, the son of senior Congress leader P Chidambaram; the Supreme Court has sent back the matter to the Madras High Court and has asked it to decide on it. The apex court, on Wednesday, has sent back Karti Chidambaram’s plea challenging the Look Out Circular issued by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to the Madras High Court which would now decide on the merits and issues of territorial jurisdiction. The Supreme Court has also said that a division bench headed by High Court chief justice will decide the petitions on LOC within 2 months from today.
It added that CBI’s stand that Madras High Court had no territorial jurisdiction shall be kept open for adjudication by the high court. The Madras High Court can decide on merits of the applications of accused, including Karti’s, seeking nod to go abroad, the apex court said. The Lookout Circular issued on June 16 and July 18 last year against Karti and others will remain in force till Madras HC decides cases.
The Supreme Court had yesterday sought the Enforcement Directorate’s reply on a plea of Karti Chidambaram, son of former Union Minister P Chidambaram, against provisional attachment of his properties in the Aircel-Maxis deal case. The top court asked the investigating agency to file a reply on the petitions of Karti and a firm against provisional attachment of their properties in connection with a money-laundering probe in the Aircel-Maxis deal case. A bench of Justices Arun Mishra and Amitava Roy sought a detailed reply from the ED by March 8, after the agency said it needed time to file some additional documents in the case. Senior advocate Anand Grover, who was appointed by the apex court as special prosecutor in the 2G cases and was representing the ED, said although they have filed some documents, some additional papers need to be filed and hence some time should be granted. The matters were taken up for hearing before the bench headed by Justice Arun Mishra after Chief Justice of India Dipak Misra recused from hearing the pleas on January 10.
On January 18, Karti Chidambaram was questioned for about 11 hours by officials of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the INX Media money laundering case. The central probe agency had registered a case against him and others in May last year. It had registered an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR), the ED’s equivalent of a police FIR, against the accused named in a CBI complaint, including Karti Chidambaram, INX Media and its directors, Peter and Indrani Mukerjea.
