Gandhis not entitled to copy of police FIR in National Herald case, rules Delhi court

New Delhi: A court here on Tuesday set aside a magisterial court's order directing the Delhi Police to provide a copy of an FIR registered by them against Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi in connection with the National Herald case.

Special Judge Vishal Gogne was hearing a plea filed by the Delhi Police, challenging the magisterial court's order, arguing that Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and others mentioned in the case are not entitled to a copy of the FIR.

The judge, however, ruled that the accused may be informed that the FIR has been registered.

Delhi Police, on October 3, filed an FIR against Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, and other accused in the National Herald case on a complaint by the ED as part of the federal probe agency's money laundering probe into charges that the Gandhis "abused" their position for personal gains.

The police mentioned criminal conspiracy, dishonest misappropriation of property, criminal breach of trust and cheating charges in the FIR that names the Gandhis, Congress leaders Suman Dubey and Sam Pitroda, entities like the Young Indian (YI) and Dotex Merchandise Ltd, Dotex promoter Sunil Bhandari, Associated Journals Ltd (AJL), and unknown others.

These entities, except unknown others, are also named as accused in the ED chargesheet filed before a Delhi court in April.

The federal probe agency used powers available to it under Section 66(2) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to get the police FIR registered.

This section allows the federal agency to share evidence for registration of a criminal predicate offence by a law enforcement agency so that it can subsequently book a money laundering case to take forward the investigation.

Meanwhile, the court on Tuesday refused to take cognisance of the Enforcement Directorate's money laundering charge against Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi, and five others in the National Herald case while noting that the chargesheet is based on a probe into a complaint by a private person and not on an FIR of a predicate offence.