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ED opposes in Bombay HC plea of Anil Deshmukh’s spouse Aarti towards attachment of property

Through PTI

MUMBAI: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Monday hostile within the Bombay Top Court docket a plea filed via former Maharashtra house minister Anil Deshmukh’s spouse, Aarti, difficult the provisional attachment of property in a cash laundering case.

The ED, in a sworn statement, stated the petition was once now not maintainable as the problems raised in it may well be put ahead ahead of an adjudicating authority which is seized of the topic touching on the attachment of property underneath the Prevention of Cash Laundering Act (PMLA).

The affidavit additional stated the Act supplies for statutory mechanisms to boost the problem ahead of the adjudicating authority.

Additional, the adjudicating authority has concluded the listening to and closed the topic for order, stated the ED.

A department bench headed via Justice G S Patel on Monday took the affidavit on file and posted the topic for additional listening to on January 19.

In December 2021, the bench had accredited the adjudicating authority to listen to and cross ultimate orders at the provisional attachment of property belong to Anil Deshmukh and his spouse Aarti, however restrained it from taking any coercive motion pending listening to of her plea within the HC.

Aarti Deshmukh, within the petition, had contended that the authority is meant to incorporate a chairperson and two contributors, considered one of whom needs to be compulsorily from regulation background, however this rule isn’t being adopted.

The authority is a quasi-judicial frame established underneath the PMLA that adjudicates on issues attached with attachment of houses.

Anil Deshmukh, a senior NCP chief, is lately in prison underneath judicial custody within the case.

Previous ultimate 12 months, the ED had provisionally connected property price over Rs 4 crore belonging to Anil Deshmukh (71) and his circle of relatives.

The ED had initiated a probe after the Central Bureau of Investigation filed an FIR towards Anil Deshmukh following a initial inquiry into the allegations of corruption and legit misconduct levelled towards him via former Mumbai police commissioner Param Bir Singh.

The NCP chief, who resigned from the state cupboard in April 2021, has denied any wrongdoing.