The Delhi High Court on Thursday granted bail to former Mumbai Police Chief Sanjay Pandey in the money laundering case registered by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in relation to the alleged phone tapping at the National Stock Exchange. The bail was granted with conditions by Justice Jasmeet Singh.
The detailed order was awaited.
The ED in September this year had filed a charge sheet in Delhi’s Rouse Avenue court in connection with a Prevention of Money Laundering case pertaining to phone tapping of NSE employees between 2009 and 2017.
The charge sheet was filed against NSE’s former chiefs, Chitra Ramakrishna and
Ravi Narain, and former Mumbai Police Commissioner Sanjay Pandey.
“Money was laundered in phone tapping. The payments made in the phone tapping are alleged proceeds of crime. There were shell companies through which money was laundered,” it said in the charge sheet.
The ED has claimed that Pandey received Rs 4.54 crore to tap the MTNL lines to help Ramakrishna, and these were the proceeds of crime.
“Pandey ran iSec Securities Pvt. Ltd. It has been alleged that Ramkrishna used this firm to tap the phones of NSE employees. The phone calls made by NSE employees between 9 a.m. and 10 a.m. were tapped and recorded by iSec Securities Pvt. Ltd. It has been alleged that Pandey helped in tapping the phone calls illegally,” an agency source had said.
Ramkrishna and Pandey were placed under arrest in July by the federal anti-money laundering agency.
Pandey had said that he tapped the phone lines, but didn’t do anything illegal. He said that all the equipment for tapping were made available by the NSE.
The ED’s case is on the basis of the CBI’s FIR, lodged on the directions of the Union Ministry of Home Affairs.
In addition to Pandey and former MD and CEO of NSE Chitra Ramkrishna, the CBI has also named another former NSE CEO and MD Ravi Narain in the case. It is alleged iSec Securities Pvt. Ltd, one of the firms that conducted a security audit of NSE, had illegally tapped phones of NSE employees during 2009-17, the CBI said.
The company was incorporated by Pandey in March 2001 and he quit as its director in May 2006. His son and mother took over charge of the company.
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