Black money case: ED moves SC seeking Hasan's remand

NEW DELHI: Stung by a Mumbai court's rejection of its plea for custodial interrogation of Hasan Ali Khan, the Enforcement Directorate today moved the Supreme Court challenging refusal of its plea against the Pune-based stud farm owner allegedly involved in stashing huge amount of black money abroad.

A bench of justices B Sudershan Reddy and S S Nijjar would take up the plea at 2 pm.

The bench had earlier chided the Centre for failing to subject Khan and other alleged money launderers to custodial interrogation.

In pursuant of the apex court's direction, the ED had moved a remand application before the court of Principal Sessions Judge M L Tahaliyani on March 11, which, however, rejected the Directorate's plea on the ground that the agency could not gather sufficient material in justification of its plea.

On March 11, the ED had suffered a major setback when judge Tahaliyani rejected its plea for Khan's 14-day custodial interrogation and granted him bail after observing contents of some of its "confidential" documents were "available in Wikipedia".

Khan is facing a Rs 70,000 crore tax demand notice from the Income-Tax Department as well as the ED probe.

The ED had arrested 53-year-old Khan on March 7 after being pulled up by the Supreme Court for its failure to ensure his custodial interrogation.