Mumbai: The special PMLA court has granted bail to builder Lalit Tekchandani, who is accused of laundering Rs 423 crore collected from prospective flat buyers. The court granted relief, observing that “prolonged incarceration cannot be permitted to convert into pre-trial detention without any proceedings concluding in near future”.
Tekchandani’s lawyer, Taraq Sayed, had pleaded that his client is in custody since March 18, 2024, with no progress in trial. The defence claimed that as per the rule, the trial in the predicate offence and the money laundering case has to go together. However, the same will take long to progress, given the sheer number of witnesses, argued Sayed.
There are 36 witnesses in the money laundering case, 42 in the first scheduled offence registered with the Chembur police and a whopping 526 in the offence filed with the Taloja police, the defence pointed out. It added that there is no chance that the trial will be completed in the near future.
According to the ED, Tekchandani is a director of M/s Supreme Construction and Developers Pvt Ltd and the firm 56,980 sq m of land in Taloja during 2008-09. It started developing a residential project under a rental housing scheme floated by the state government.
Despite collecting hundreds of crores from buyers, the accused is yet to give flat possession, which was promised in 2016. The defence informed that the project is 75% completed.
ED prosecutor Arvind Aghav, objected to the bail plea, however, the court said that the application is not filed on case merits but on the ground of long incarceration.
The court noted that the agency has requested for framing of charge and proceeding further with the trial. “It appears that the draft charge was given only with an intention to see that the applicant should not be released on bail on the ground of delay in proceeding further with the trial,” the court said.
The fact remains that no intimation has been filed on record by the ED intimating that the probe has been completed in all respects and it does not intend to file any supplementary complaint, it added.
