Delhi High Court reserves order on plea by Mahua Moitra to restrain ED from leaking info to media on FEMA probe

The Delhi High Court on Thursday reserved its order on a plea by Trinamool Congress (TMC) leader Mahua Moitra to restrain the Enforcement Directorate (ED) from leaking sensitive and unverified information to the media in relation to the agency’s investigation against her for an alleged violation of the Foreign Exchange Maintenance Act, 1999 (FEMA)..Justice Subramonium Prasad heard the matter and reserved the verdict, which he said would be pronounced tomorrow..Moitra has alleged that the ED has been leaking sensitive information to the media regarding a FEMA probe in connection with which she was summoned recently.The ED has told the Court that it has not leaked any information to the media and that it does not know how the information about Moitra being summoned in the case was made known to the press..Senior Advocate Rebecca John appeared for Mahua Moitra and argued that information about the case was published by the media even before she received the summons. She said that there has been a violation of Moitra's rights under Article 21 of the Constitution."I am not against ED's right to investigate. I am saying I will submit to their jurisdiction. It is about the information being leaked prior to being communicated to me. ED is drip-feeding confidential information to the media," John said..The Court, however, asked John about how the reports of Moitra moving to court were published in the media even before the court heard the matter."You are a public personality, a public person," Justice Prasad added..Notably, Moitra had also made nineteen media houses party to her case and sought directions to restrain them from publishing and circulating any “unverified, unconfirmed, false, derogatory content” against her.She had called for directions so that news reporting on the ED's case would be in tune with the official press releases that may be issued by the ED.The media houses party to Moitra's case included ANI, Business Today, Economic Times, Financial Express, Hindustan Times, India TV, Indian Express, Mint, Moneycontrol, NDTV, Times Group, and others..Advocate Siddhant Kumar appeared for ANI today and argued that the media has a right to publish source-based information and that journalists have been reporting source-based information for a long time.Kumar added that the prayers sought by Mahua Moitra would have a chilling effect on the media. "I am entitled to investigate and publish source-based information. We have been reporting source-based information since a long time. It because of source based information that scandals like Watergate in the US came to light," he said..Additional Solicitor General Chetan Sharma appeared for the Central government and highlighted that the media got to know about Moitra moving to court in the matter based on source-based information. He added that the government cannot answer the questions raised by Moitra's plea..According to news reports, the ED had issued summons to Moitra last week and asked her to appear before it on February 19 in connection with a probe into alleged FEMA violations.She was asked to appear before the agency's headquarters in Delhi with some documents related to some foreign investments, it was reported.The reports claimed that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) too is conducting a preliminary inquiry into the allegations against her on a reference from the Lokpal..The TMC leader moved a petition before the High Court alleging that the ED has leaked sensitive information to the media, including the details of the allegations against her and the fact that she had sought more time to appear before the agency.The ED has acted against the procedure prescribed under the law by leaking “confidential, half-baked, speculative/unconfirmed information to the media in relation to the ongoing proceedings /investigation”, thereby compromising the investigation, the plea said.“Such leakage of information has hampered the process of the investigation and also violated the rights of the Petitioner such as privacy, dignity of the individual concerned as well as her right to fair investigation," the plea added.