Interim protection from arrest granted to Siva Sankar will continue, says HC
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Kochi: The Kerala High Court on Friday reserved its orders on the anticipatory bail pleas filed by M Sivasankar IAS, ex-Principal Secretary to the Kerala Chief Minister, in the cases registered in connection with the smuggling of gold through diplomatic channel.
The court reserved the orders for October 28 after hearing the arguments of the counsels of Enforcement Directorate, Customs and of the applicant. Till further orders, the interim protection from arrest granted earlier to him will continue.
Additional Solicitor General of India, SV Raju, appearing for the ED, said that Sivasankar was aware of the activities of Swapna Suresh, the key accused in the case. He further said that the ED had strong reasons to believe that Sivasankar was the "kingpin" of the illegal transactions.
"We have reasons to believe that Swapna was only a pawn and Siva Sankar was the real beneficiary. Swapna was completely under his control and strings were pulled by him," SV Raju contended.
He further argued that custodial interrogation is essential in economic offences and the discretion to grant anticipatory bail cannot be exercised, referring to the Supreme Court decisions in P Chidambaram v Enforcement Directorate and other cases.
On the other hand, P Vijayabhanu, appearing for Sivasankar, said that even in the complaint filed by the ED there is no allegation that Sivasankar is the kingpin and that anticipatory bail can be granted for any offence, if there is no statutory bar.