A Delhi court on Wednesday sent senior Congress leader and former Karnataka minister D.K. Shivakumar into the custody of the Enforcement Directorate till September 13 in a money laundering case. Though the agency had sought 14-day custody to interrogate Shivakumar, who was arrested on Tuesday night, Special Judge Ajay Kumar Kuhar granted only 10 days.
The court said Shivakumar would be allowed to meet his family and lawyers for half-an-hour every day.
Earlier, the Congress leader was brought to the court after he underwent medical check up at Ram Manohar Lohia hospital.
His lawyers Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Dayan Krishnan opposed the ED's plea for custodial interrogation saying that he had joined the probe and never absconded. Singhvi said the police remand is a rare exception and cannot be granted in a mechanical manner.
However, the agency claimed that he was "evasive and non-cooperative" during the probe and there was phenomenal growth in his income while he was in an important position. The ED, represented by Additional Solicitor General K.M. Natraj and advocate N.K. Matta, said Shivakumar's custody was required as he had to be confronted with voluminous documents and to unearth illegal properties.
It said Shivakumar's interrogation was needed to ascertain the source of money and unearth the modus operandi and that he did not explain cash seized in search.
Shivakumar, a sitting MLA from Kanakapura seat, was arrested by the ED under provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) on Tuesday night after being questioned for four days.
He had landed in Delhi on Friday to appear before the ED after the Karnataka High Court on Thursday dismissed his petition challenging the summons issued to him by the agency.
Soon after his arrest, the Congress strongman had said the I-T and ED cases against him were politically motivated and that he was a victim of BJP's “politics of vengeance and vendetta”.
The central agency had in September last year registered a money laundering case against Shivakumar, Haumanthaiah, an employee at Karnataka Bhavan in New Delhi, and others.
The ED case has been filed based on a charge sheet (prosecution complaint) filed by the Income Tax Department against him last year before a special court in Bengaluru on charges of alleged tax evasion and hawala transactions worth crores.
The I-T department has accused Shivakumar and his associate S.K. Sharma of transporting huge amount of unaccounted cash on a regular basis through 'hawala' channels with the help of three other accused.
