New Delhi: Calling the Enforcement Directorate chargesheet against Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and others in the National Herald case “vendetta in legal disguise”, the Congress has refuted money laundering charges against its top leadership, saying there was “not even a whiff” of a crime of any sort.
The party has also emphasised that neither the stakeholders of Associated Journals (AJL), publisher of the National Herald, nor the public has made complaints of cheating.
ThePrint has reported that the ED levelled the allegations that the Gandhis hatched a conspiracy to acquire AJL assets, worth nearly Rs 2,000 crore, in exchange for a mere Rs 50 lakh by establishing Young Indian and converting all AJL assets in the new company’s name. The Gandhis, the agency said, hold a 38 percent stake each in Young Indian.
A day after a Delhi court took on record the ED chargesheet against Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and five other accused, Jairam Ramesh, the chief of the Congress communications department, and Abhishek Manu Singhvi, a senior party leader and advocate, addressed the press on Wednesday.
The ED, the leaders stressed, filed the charge sheet against the Gandhis without having any answers to whether there was “criminal intent”, “evidence beyond a reasonable doubt”, or who from the party was a “beneficiary of the criminal activity”.
Asked if the party made a political miscalculation in making the Gandhis directors of Young Indian, a company closely linked to AJL, for preserving the National Herald, the leaders said Congress, National Herald and AJL have, since inception, been inseparable.
“AJL was very much part of the Congress party. It was very much [a] part of the freedom movement. A Congress leader started it. It had Congressmen as its members, so you can not divorce the AJL from the Indian National Congress,” Jairam Ramesh said.
“Can you separate National Herald, AJL and Congress party? They have been inseparable since inception. If Congress senior leaders are not directors in AJL, which runs the National Herald, will Advani ji (L.K. Advani) be its director?” Abhishek Manu Singhvi said.
“The ED should answer why it has never touched any NDA ally or BJP leader. Selective justice is nothing but political thuggery. It is the strangest of strange cases and would have been legally funny if it were not an example of political animosity,” Singhvi added.
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Addressing the ED allegations on the launch of Young Indian as a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) for fraudulently acquiring AJL assets at cheap rates, Abhishek Manu Singhvi said it would be the first time in criminal history that a not-for-profit company’s launch and the conversion of debt into equity would attract anti-money laundering law provisions.
He said AJL was founded on certain ideals, and the AJL by itself was not economically sustainable when Congress had been funding the firm in different tranches over fifty years. “The total debt rose to Rs 90 crore, and the idea was to preserve the old brand of AJL. Hence, we envisaged how to make AJL a debt-free company. So, the Rs 90-crore debt was transferred to a newly incorporated Young India on paper,” Abhishek Manu Singhvi said.
He explained the clearing of all debt incurred by the AJL account by debt conversion to AJL equity and shares, which later got transferred to Young India, helmed by Sonia Gandhi, Rahul, Motilal Vora and Oscar Fernandes as its directors.
“Nearly 100 percent of the stakes went to Young Indian. There was no sale or purchase of immovable properties. We would be foolish to establish Young India if we wanted to commit money laundering. There was no transfer of ownership of properties to Young India. Only the shareholding of AJL was transferred to Young India,” Abhishek Manu Singhvi added.
“The allegation is that Young Indian directors usurped AJL properties and funds. Which director who sold or purchased assets made money? Give us one property acquired or sold off by any directors. Where is the money trail?” he explained.
According to Abhishek Manu Singhvi, in 1955, a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court said that a holding company could not claim ownership of the properties of a firm, even with a 100 percent stake.
“If AJL assets are not transferred and [remain] intact, legally, AJL has ownership rights till Young Indian does not purchase these properties. Then, how are Young Indian directors going a step further and committing the offence of money laundering?” he argued.
On the contrary, the ED alleged that by transferring a majority of the shareholding of AJL to Young Indian, the Gandhis and others accused in the chargesheet “effectively” transferred the ownership of all properties owned by AJL to the top Congress leadership.
“The accused—by entering into a criminal conspiracy—converted an outstanding loan of Rs 90.21 crore given by AICC (All India Congress Committee) to AJL into Rs 9.02 crore-worth equity shares and transferred all these shares in favour of Young Indian for only 50 lakh,” alleged an ED source aware of the case while speaking to ThePrint. “By transferring the majority shareholding of AJL to Young Indian, the accused effectively transferred the beneficial ownership of all properties of AJL—worth thousands of crores—to Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi.”
Expounding on the rebuttal that neither the AJL stakeholders nor the public had any complaints, Jairam Ramesh further said that companies in the corporate world, as a routine procedure, establish new companies for debt transfer. There was—Ramesh emphasised—no violation of the laid-down procedures on that account.
(Edited by Madhurita Goswami)
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