Special Delhi court extends bizman Thampi's ED remand till Jan 28

A special Delhi court on Friday extended till January 28 the ED remand of NRI businessman CC Thampi, a close aide of Robert Vadra, in connection with a money laundering case.

After hearing arguments from both the sides, Special Judge Arvind Kumar extended the remand by four days and asked the Enforcement Directorate (ED) officials to conclude the interrogation in the matter.

The bail petition filed by Thampi will also be heard on the next date.

Advocate Amit Mahajan, appearing for the ED, said the agency cannot be blamed for the slow pace of questioning as the accused has some medical issues and is being given sufficient time during interrogation.

"We need more time as some new facts have surfaced in the matter. We need to confront him with these facts," Mahajan told the court, seeking an extension of the remand.

However, Thampi's counsel senior advocate Raju Ramachandran strongly opposed the extension of remand arguing that he has already made 16 appearances before the agency.

"He (Thampi) has made 16 appearances and has been questioned for over 80 hours. 30,000 pages worth documents have been seized. His medical condition is also not good. He is suffering from prostate cancer," Ramachandran told the court.

According to ED, CC Thampi along with Sanjay Bhandari and Vadra conspired the strategy for money laundering.

It said that the investigation revealed that USD 4.9 million were received in 2008 in the undisclosed bank accounts of Santech International FZC in Dubai, a company owned by Sanjay Bhandari.

A company -- Sky Lite Investment -- was floated in 2009 by CC Thampi for allegedly acquiring immovable assets while no actual business was being done by the said company.

ED said that the money trail made by Skylite Investment to Vertex Management shows a huge cash deposit in the account of these compes.

According to ED, Thampi during questioning failed to explain why Bhandari was monitoring the purchase of properties by his compes and why Sky Lite Investment FZE was transferred to different persons without monetary consideration.

Thampi, an NRI, and his three compes -- 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.

( With inputs from ANI )