A Delhi court on Monday accepted the ED’s closure report in a money laundering case against Suresh Kalmadi, the former head of the 2010 Commonwealth Games organising committee, its then secretary general Lalit Bhanot and others.
This brings to end the money laundering angle in the alleged scam, which triggered a massive political uproar during the Congress-led UPA government.
Kalmadi faces another corruption case linked to the CWG Games, in which the CBI has accused him of irregularities in awarding a contract to a Swiss firm, allegedly causing a loss of more than `90 crore to the exchequer. In this case, he was arrested on April 24, 2011 and, nine months later, granted bail by the High Court.
On Monday, Rouse Avenue Court Special Judge Sanjeev Aggarwal said in his order: “Since during the investigations, the prosecution has failed to make out a offence under section 3 (money laundering) of the PMLA… as no offence under section 3 of the PMLA has been made out or has been committed, despite discreet investigations by the ED, therefore, there is no reason to continue with the present ECIR, as a consequence, the closure report filed by the ED stands accepted.”
While accepting the ED’s closure report, the court noted that the CBI had already closed the corruption case based on which the ED had started its money laundering probe. In this case, the CBI had also named as accused the then COO of the CWG organising committee, Vijay Kumar Gautam, its then treasurer A K Matto and Event Knowledge Services, Switzerland, among others.
Kalmadi and the others were accused of awarding two key contracts in a “wrongful manner” to Event Knowledge Services (EKS) and Ernst and Young, allegedly causing a loss of `30 crore to the CWG organising panel.
The CBI’s closure report — it stated that “no incriminating evidence surfaced during the investigation in the matter” — was filed in January 2014 and was accepted by a Delhi court in February 2016.
