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| HC quashes PMLA case against former Bank Chairman and others | | | Early Times Report
JAMMU, Jan 9: Justice Javed Iqbal Wani of Jammu & Kashmir and Ladakh High Court quashed 250 crores money laundering case against former chairman of Jammu and Kashmir State Co-operative Bank Limited Mohammad Shafi Dar and Chairman of River Jhelum Co-operative House Building Society, Hilal Ahmad Mir,and Abdul Hamid Hajam.
Justice Javed Iqbal Wani after hearing both the sides observed that the complaint, had admittedly been transferred/credited directly into the accounts of the land owners and the petitioners herein had never been in possession or control of the said money, which is alleged to have been laundered. As has been pointed out earlier, in order to constitute the offence of money-laundering, it is imperative that one should be first in possession of the "proceeds of crime" and then engage in an activity to project it as untainted property, which however, is missing in the instant case. In the instant case, "proceeds of crime" in favour of the petitioners would have arisen only had the petitioners developed the plots in the colony and sold them to earn profit in the process, in that, the said profits would have been the "proceeds of crime" and any activity related to such profits may have resulted in money-laundering, which stage in the instant case has not reached. The fact that the money that was transferred in the accounts of the land owners which had been attached on the premise that the same is "proceeds of crime" and was released in favour of the said land owners by the orders of the Apex Court cannot be overlooked, in that, if the said money in the accounts of the land owners was "proceeds of crime", the same would not have been ordered to be released in favour of the land owners and treating the said money in the accounts of the land owners for the purpose of making out a case of money-laundering against the petitioners herein under said circumstances cannot but said to be not only abuse of process of law, but as well an attempt to overreach the orders of the Apex Court, in that, the transaction between the land owners and the Society essentially has been treated as a genuine transaction by the Apex Court while ordering release of money in question in favour of the land owners.
Court further observed that what emanates from the above is that none of the ingredients of the offence of money-laundering against the petitioners herein is found to be existing in the present case, more so in view of the fact that an act of mortgaging the property with the Bank for securing the loan that is said to have been obtained fraudulently without following Banking rules and regulations cannot by any stretch of imagination be termed as money-laundering and that the act of the petitioners herein of having fraudulently secured loan for development and establishment of satellite township by submitting false documents, at the most makes out a case for forgery or Bank fraud. For what has been observed, considered and analysed hereinabove, the instant petitions succeed, as a consequence whereof, the impugned complaints qua the petitioners in both the petitions are quashed, Court ordered.
—(JNF) |
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