SIT empowered to further probe cases already investigated

NEW DELHI: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) appointed by the Supreme Court on Monday is empowered to probe those cases relating to black money in which the probe agencies failed to act with "alarcity" in arriving at desirable results.

"That the SIT also be empowered to further investigate even where charge sheets have been previously filed and that the SIT may register further cases and conduct appropriate investigations and initiate proceedings for the purpose of bringing back unaccounted monies unlawfully kept in bank accounts abroad," a bench of justices B Sudershan Reddy and S S Nijjar said.

The order assumes importance as the Enforcement Directorate had filed a charge sheet against Pune stud farm owner Hassan Ali Khan in a case of alleged FEMA violation and money laudering without informing the apex court.

Khan had even succeeded in getting bail from the trial court, which was later cancelled by the apex court which had pulled up the ED for keeping it in the dark as the charge sheet was filed a day after the hearing before it.