Moser Baer case: Court discharges Nitin Bhatnagar, a Maltese Citizen, in ED matter

New Delhi: The Rouse Avenue Court has ordered to discharge Nitin Bhatnagar, a Maltese Citizen arrested in connection with his alleged involvement in the offence of money laundering in a case of M/s Moser Baer India Ltd. and others and said, "In this case, no suspicion arises that the accused might have committed the offence for which the Supplementary Chargesheet has been filed against him".
The Special Judge Sanjeev Aggarwal in an order passed on Saturday asserted, "It cannot be said that accused may have committed the offence i.e. to say the matter should go to the trial. That is to say, prosecution has failed to make out a prima facie case for framing of charges qua this accused, for which he was being prosecuted by filing the prosecution complaint. If there is no suspicion, then why should the accused go through rigours of trial all the way."
When there is no iota of legally admissible evidence against him to go for trial, doing so would be itself violative of Article 21 of the Constitution of India, as the same cannot be said to be the procedure established by law. When two views are possible, one which gives rise to some suspicion as distinguished from grave suspicion, the accused will be liable to be discharged, added the court.
During arguments, appearing for Bhatnagar, Senior Advocate Vikas Pahwa submitted that the accused argued that the standard of proof for deciding the bail application of an accused u/S. 45 of PMLA is different from the standard of proof required for framing of charge, as the yardstick for framing of charge would be on the higher side than the order on the bail, which is to be decided on broad probabilities, both are close to each other.
Along with Senior Advocate Vikas Pahwa, Advocate Ashish Hira appeared for Nitin Bhatnagar.
The court in its order also noted that the present accused has not been named in the predicate offence / FIR lodged by the CBI as mentioned in the 3rd supplementary prosecution complaint. All the corporate entities i.e. with regard to the Pristine River
Investment Ltd. and IPF Real Estate were admittedly incorporated as per the relevant laws prevailing in the said countries. The accused was only working as a relationship manager in the Bank of Singapore and he was not controlling any of the corporate entities involved in any of the above-mentioned transactions.
Bhatnagar was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 on August 22, 2023.
Lawyers appeared for Bhatnagar earlier submitted that the accused/applicant is a citizen of Malta, whereas his father lives in Delhi and his arrest was 'not legal' as no permission was there to further investigate the case. Bhatnagar was neither named in the FIR (of the Scheduled Offence) nor in the ECIR of the present ED case nor his name does appear in the main Prosecution Complaints.
It was further submitted that the accused/applicant joined the investigation for 25 consecutive dates from the month of January 2020. The ED had even officially removed the LOC (in the year 2022) issued qua him as he had cooperated with it during the course of the investigation.
The accused later came to know that the LOC was revived by him on 14.08.2023 and that before the said date, the applicant had returned to India for some business engagements.
He was arrested at the Airport on 22.08.2023, while he was going to board a flight to return home. This act on the part of the ED gives rise to reasonable concerns about the timing and underlying intent of their action despite full cooperation on the part of the accused/ applicant, stated Counsel appeared for Bhatnagar.
According to ED, the investigation was initiated against M/s Moser Baer India Ltd. and others under the provisions of PMLA, 2002 on the basis of FIR dated 17.08.2019 registered by CBI under various sections of IPC and Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.
The account of M/s Moser Baer India Ltd. was declared as Fraud by the complainant bank on 20.04.2019 and the loan amount was siphoned off by the directors, namely Ratul Puri (Nephew of Congress leader Kamalnath) and his family members.
As per the ED Nitin Bhatnagar helped in opening a bank account in April 2011 in the name of M/s Pristine River Investments Limited in the Bank of Singapore. M/s Pristine River Investments Limited was a Dubai-based investment holding company, under the direction of Ratul Puri. The entity M/s Pristine River Investments Limited was fully owned by the Savannah Trust. Ratul Puri was the settler of the Savannah Trust.
ED investigation revealed that M/s Pristine River Investments Limited received the proceeds of crime amounting to USD 14.18 million from M/s UHY Saxena, M/s Mercon Commodities and M/s Midas Metals International, entities that were managed and controlled by Rajiv Saxena.
According to the ED, Rajiv Saxena is a hawala operator and an accommodation entry provider who runs an accommodation entry business in Dubai, and has laundered proceeds of crime for Moser Baer India Limited. He has created structures for laundering the proceeds of crime generated by Ratul Puri and his family members.
ED further said that, the investigation has revealed that the account of M/s Pristine River Investments Limited has been used for the layering of proceeds of crime and Nitin Bhatnagar was actively involved in the layering of these proceeds of crime for the main accused Ratul Puri. Earlier, ED, in this case, arrested the businessman, Ratul Puri in the year 2019.
Further, during the investigation Rajiv Saxena, the hawala operator and Rajiv Aggarwal, a close associate of Ratul Puri, were arrested in 2021 and prosecution complaints have been already filed against these accused persons. Property amounting to USD 47.95 million has been already attached in this case, stated the ED.