SC junks plea challenging order to consider NDTV's application under FEMA

The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a plea by the ED challenging a Bombay High Court order, which directed the RBI to consider the compounding applications filed by NDTV in a case of alleged FEMA violation.

A bench of Justice Abhay S Oka and Justice Augustine George Masih said no case for interference was made out.

The high court, in its 2018 order, set aside objections raised to the compounding proceedings by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which had earlier flagged the alleged Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) violations and issued showcause notices to NDTV.

In November 2015, the ED issued showcause notices to the news organisation for allegedly flouting foreign exchange regulations while availing of overseas and foreign direct investment facilities to the tune of more than Rs 2,000 crore.

In March 2016, NDTV filed an application with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) for compounding of the contraventions alleged in the showcause notices.

However, a year later, the RBI told NDTV that it could not consider its application since the ED had written to it on December 1, 2017, expressing suspicion and making further allegations of money laundering against the company and its subsidiaries in some other cases as well.

NDTV then approached the high court, challenging, among other things, the ED's December 1 letter to the RBI.

It told the high court that even though it was denying all allegations made by the ED in its 2015 showcause notices, it had chosen to go for compounding proceedings to save further agony to its shareholders and other stakeholders.

Compounding under FEMA refers to the process of voluntarily admitting a contravention and seeking redress.

While the RBI is empowered to compound contraventions under FEMA, the ED counsel had pointed out before the high court that in February 2007, the Union government introduced a proviso to the compounding rules.

The proviso mandated that if the ED was of the view that the compounding proceeding was related to a serious contravention involving suspected money laundering, terror financing or anything affecting the sovereignty and integrity of the nation, such cases would not be compounded by the RBI.

The ED lawyer had also submitted some documents, containing allegations and suspicions of money laundering made by the agency and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) against NDTV and some of its subsidiary companies in several past cases, including the 2G "scam".

This was vehemently opposed by NDTV's counsel.

He had argued that the statutory powers vested in the RBI could not be interfered with "on mere suspicion".