New Delhi:
A Delhi court on Friday issued formal notices to Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi in connection with the National Herald money laundering case, following a probe by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and a legal dispute that stretches back over a decade.
Special Judge Vishal Gogne noted the significance of affording the accused the right to be heard. “Right to be heard at any stage breathes life into a fair trial,” Judge Gogne observed, setting the next hearing for May 8.
The ED’s investigation formally began in 2021 after a magistrate court took up a private criminal complaint filed in June 2014 by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy. The complaint alleged criminal conspiracy and financial misconduct involving top Congress leadership in relation to the now-defunct National Herald newspaper.
The allegations centre around the acquisition of the newspaper’s parent company, Associated Journals Limited (AJL), and the subsequent formation of Young Indian, a not-for-profit entity in which both Sonia and Rahul Gandhi reportedly hold 38 per cent of the shares. The ED claims that the structure was designed to facilitate the indirect acquisition of prime real estate assets valued at over Rs 2,000 crore-assets that originally belonged to AJL.
The ED claims that Congress had extended an unsecured loan of around Rs 90 crore to AJL, which was later assigned to Young Indian for a nominal Rs 50 lakh. This, the agency claims, allowed Young Indian to gain control of AJL and its properties, which include valuable real estate in Delhi, Lucknow and Mumbai. The ED has accused the Gandhis and other Congress figures of laundering approximately Rs 988 crore through this arrangement.
The Congress party has accused the ED and the Centre of using investigative agencies as tools of political vengeance.. Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge addressed party leaders in New Delhi recently, stating that the party would not be cowed by what he described as “a spirit of vendetta”.
“You must have noticed how, as part of a big conspiracy, the names of CPP Chairperson Sonia Gandhi and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi have been put in the chargesheet in the National Herald case,” Mr Kharge said.
The Congress has long maintained that Young Indian is a not-for-profit company.
