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Money laundering case: ED issues fresh summons to Mehbooba Mufti, HC declines relief

Mehbooba has been asked by the ED to appear before it in Delhi on March 22

New Delhi March 19: The Delhi High Court on Friday refused to stay the summons issued by the Enforcement Directorate to former Jammu & Kashmir chief minister Mehbooba Mufti and issued a notice to the agency and Centre in her petition challenging the summons and Section 50 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002.

While asking Mufti and government counsels to file their legal notes in the case, the division bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Jasmeet Singh adjourned the hearing of the case to April 16. Mehbooba has been asked by the ED to appear before it in Delhi on March 22.

On March 10, the ED had told the division bench of Justices Siddharth Mridul and Anup Jairam Bhambhani that it will not insist Mufti’s appearance before it on March 15 and will issue fresh summons for a date subsequent to March 19, the date of today’s hearing.

Mufti, in her challenge against the summons issued to her by the central agency in an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR), has said that she apprehends she may be made an accused by the ED. The Peoples Democratic Party leader in the petition also alleged that the state has resorted to “a series of hostile acts” against her acquaintances and family friends ever since her release from preventive detention last year.

“She has not been informed if she is being summoned as an accused or as a witness. She has also not been informed of what she is being summoned in connection with, and the scheduled offence under the PMLA which gave rise to the proceedings in respect of which Impugned Summons has been issued to her,” Mufti has said through her counsel Prasanna S in the petition

 

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