ED opposes IAS officer Singhal's bail plea claims she spent most of her time outside jail while in custody

     New Delhi, Mar 15 (PTI) The Enforcement Directorate on Friday opposed the bail application of suspended Jharkhand cadre IAS officer Puja Singhal, claiming she has spent most of her time outside jail while in custody in a money laundering case.
    A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna, Dipankar Datta and Augustine George Masih took serious note of the ED's claim and asked it to file a tabulated chart with details of Singhal's time spent in custody.
    "If we find that she has spent more than 50 per cent of time in custody in hospital, then we will not hear your bail application," the bench told senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, appearing for Singhal.
    Additional Solicitor General SV Raju, while opposing her bail application said, "She is a very influential person. Out of the total period in custody, she has only spent 231 days in jail and 303 days in hospital. Rest of the time she was out on bail. We have CCTV footage where she can be seen loitering around in the hospital."
    Luthra disputed the figures and said she was admitted to hospital for various ailments.
    When the bench asked Raju whether she was in the jail hospital or a facility outside, the government law officer said she was admitted to Rajendra Institute of Medical Sciences (RIMS) in Ranchi and is still there.
    "This court may order for her health check-up to ascertain her ailments," he said.     
     The bench, while posting the matter for further hearing on April 29, asked the ED to furnish in 15 days the details of the time she spent in jail, in hospital and on interim bail.
    On February 10, 2023, the top court had granted Singhal interim bail for two months to enable her to take care of her ailing daughter.
    Singhal has been in custody since May 11, 2022 after raids were conducted at properties linked to her in connection with the money laundering case.
    The case relates to alleged corruption in the implementation of MGNREGA, the Centre's flagship scheme for rural employment.
    The ED has accused Singhal, a former state mines department secretary, of money laundering and said its team seized more than Rs 36 crore cash linked to alleged illegal mining as part of two separate money laundering investigations.
    Apart from the 2000 batch IAS officer, her businessman husband, a chartered accountant associated with the couple, and others were also raided by the ED as part of the money laundering probe.
     Singhal was suspended following her arrest.

(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)