Special court sends businessman CC Thampi to judicial custody, reserves order on bail

A special court in Delhi on Tuesday sent businessman CC Thampi to judicial custody till February 7 and reserved its order on a bail plea filed by him in connection with a money laundering case pertaining to the overseas properties of Robert Vadra.

Special Judge Arvind Kumar will pass the order on the bail plea tomorrow.

The court refused to extend the Enforcement Directorate (ED) remand of Thampi, which was sought by the economic offenses watchdog.

Appearing on behalf of Thampi, senior advocates Raju Ramachandran and Mohit Mathur sought bail saying "where is the question of tampering with digitised electronic records of either property transactions or bank records?"

And if the triple test is not satisfied, what else can be the argument, the defense counsel said.

Advocates Amit Mahajan and Naveen Kumar Matra, representing ED, strongly opposed the bail plea.

"The accused is an NRI and letters rogatory (LRs) have been sent. Allegations are that he purchased the property and could not provide the source. He appeared after summons were issued and didn't come on his own," the ED told the court.

ED said that Thampi's role goes beyond mere facilitation.

"He may have not generated the proceeds but he assisted in layering which makes him an accused and Section 3 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 is really clear on this," the economic offenses watchdog said.

According to ED, Thampi, along with Sanjay Bhandari and Vadra conspired together to launder money.

Thampi, an NRI, and his three companies -- Holiday City Centre, Holiday Properties, and Holiday Bekal Resorts -- were on ED radar "under FEMA for an aggregate amount of Rs 288 crore".

The ED has booked Thampi, who has businesses extending across India and the UAE, under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in connection with alleged wrongful approval for an engineering college in Thrissur by the All India Council for Technical Education in 2009.