[PMLA] Investigating agency not required to pray for permission for further investigation: Calcutta High Court

The Calcutta High Court, while cancelling the bail granted to an accused under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), has held that an investigating agency is not required to pray for permission for further investigation [Enforcement Directorate v Debabrata Halder]..Justice Tirthankar Ghosh held that the duty of the agency is simply to inform the Court that further investigation was required.“It would be apposite to state that an investigating agency is not required to pray for permission for further investigation of the case which is a settled principle of law and the same is prerogative of the investigating agency. The duty of the investigating agency is to the extent of informing the Court which the investigating agency in this case has done by informing the Court in the complaint filed before it,” said the single-judge..The opposite party, whose bail was prayed to be cancelled by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), was accused of diversion of public money to the tune of ₹173.50 crore.The accused was granted bail in April this year by a Special CBI Court which stated that no prayer was made for further investigation and no purpose would be served by keeping the accused in custody.This order was challenged by the ED.The accused argued that the plea for investigation was described in one paragraph of the complaint based on which the investigating agency sought for cancellation of bail. However, this process ought to have been exhausted before filing the complaint..The Court placed reliance on the case of YS Jagan Mohan Reddy v CBI wherein it was observed that economic offences constitute a class apart and need to be visited with different approach in the matter of bail. Justice Ghosh went on to distinguish between releasing a person who has appeared in response to summons and a person who was arrested in course of investigation..Therefore, it was noted that the complaint filed by the prosecution itself contained a prayer for further investigation, and yet the Special Court held that there was no prayer for further investigation. This reasoning was found to be in violation of Section 45 of the PMLA, which enumerates conditions for bail.With this, the bail granted to the accused was cancelled..The ED was represented by Advocate Arijit Chakraborty.Advocates Debasish Roy, Soumik Ganguly, Dilip Kumar Sadhu, Biswajit Hazra, Rajib Mukherjee, Archisman Sain, Sayan De, Sayan Kanjilal, Rakheswar Dey Sarkar, Anita Kaunda, Anubrata Dutta, Manoj Malhotra, Ravi Kumar Dubey, Samrat Dey Paul, Ayan Bhattacherjee and Aniruddha Bhattacharyya appeared for the opposite parties..[Read Order]