The Supreme Court will hear on Thursday a petition filed by Bollywood actor Jacqueline Fernandez challenging a Delhi court order framing charges against her and alleged conman Sukesh Chandrashekhar in a ₹200 crore money laundering case.
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A bench of justices PK Mishra and AS Chandurkar passed the order after Fernandez’s lawyer mentioned the matter on Tuesday for urgent listing.
The petition was filed against the decision of a Delhi court on May 30 directing framing of charges against her in the case probed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
Jaqueline has challenged the trial court order directly before the top court without approaching the Delhi high court.
Advocate Rameeza Hakim appearing for the actor said, “I have come up against the framing of charge in the ED case. This is a curious case as I am a prosecution witness in the scheduled offence while I am named as an accused in the PMLA case.”
The bench said, “We will post the matter the day after tomorrow.”
Hakim told the court that she had earlier moved an application in the ED case to turn an approver.
However, since the ED opposed the same, Fernandez withdrew the same on April 16.
The May 30 order was passed by additional sessions judge (ASJ) Prashant Sharma who held that a prima facie case is made out against Fernandez as based on the material produced by ED the accused persons have to be charged with the offence (of money laundering) under Section 3 of the PMLA, punishable under Section 4 of the PMLA.
Also Read:Jacqueline Fernandez to turn approver in money laundering case against ‘conman’ Sukesh Chandrashekhar
Later, on June 3, the charges were formally framed against Chandrashekhar, Fernandez among others following which trial in the case commenced.
The second supplementary complaint filed by the ED against Fernandez stated that she was in constant touch with Sukesh and had received valuable gifts from him. The ED had informed the trial court that Fernandez remained in constant touch with the alleged conman despite knowing his criminal antecedents. She used and enjoyed the proceeds of crime which clearly showed that she was not a “victim” in the entire chain of events.
The ED case originates from an alleged extortion case where Sukesh had induced one Aditi Singh.
It is alleged that by using spoofed calls, encrypted applications and fabricated identities, the accused induced complainant Aditi Singh and her family members to part with huge sums of money.
The prosecution alleged that Sukesh generated proceeds of crime amounting to more than ₹200 crore through extortion, cheating, impersonation and criminal intimidation, and thereafter concealed, possessed, transferred, layered and projected the same as untainted property with the help of his associates.
Sukesh has multiple cases of extortion and blackmail against him in six cities. He had impersonated top officials in the government through various phone calls from jail between 2020-21 and carried out a ₹215 crore heist by extorting this sum in tranches from one Aditi Singh, promising to get her husband released out on bail.
The investigation into the main case was probed by Delhi Police which arrested Sukesh in 2017. Later, the ED took up the probe concerning money laundering and arrested him in 2021.
The ED claimed that the alleged proceeds of crime were routed through various bank accounts, hawala channels, cash deliveries and shell entities. In this case, Fernandez along with Leena Paulose (Chandrashekhar’s wife) and several others have been implicated by ED.
