'Don't Think You're Interested' : Supreme Court To ED After It Again Sought Adjournment Of Plea To Transfer Gold Smuggling Case From Kerala

The Supreme Court today adjourned by 6 weeks hearing of a plea filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) seeking transfer of the Kerala Gold Smuggling case to Karnataka.

A bench of Justices Hrishikesh Roy and SVN Bhatti passed the order, upon a request for accommodation made by Advocate Vivek Gurnani, on behalf of ED.

Gurnani submitted that Additional Solicitor General SV Raju was not available and apologized to the Court for making the request, as a similar request had been made on earlier occasion as well.

Hearing him, Justice Roy remarked, "I don't think you are interested really...either Mr Raju is not available, or some other difficulty is coming...".

Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for State of Kerala, voiced similar sentiment, highlighting that repeated adjournments are sought in the matter, and therefore, it seems the ED is not interested in pursuing the prayer for transfer.

Be that as it may, the bench accommodated ED. The order was dictated thus:

"Once again, prayer for adjournment is made on behalf of the petitioner, citing the difficulty of the learned ASG. Mr. Kapil Sibal, learned senior counsel appearing for the respondent, submits that repeated adjournment is sought in this matter by the other side and therefore, it is apparent that they are not interested in the prayer made in the transfer petition. Be that as it may, granting the prayer made by the petitioner, the matter stands adjourned by 6 weeks."

To recap, the smuggling came to light after the Customs Commissionerate (Preventive), Cochin, seized gold worth ₹14.82 crore at the Trivandrum International Airport in July 2020. The contraband was carried in diplomatic baggage addressed to the consulate of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) at Thiruvananthapuram. A UAPA case was also registered with respect to the smuggling before the Special NIA Court at Kochi.

ED filed the present petition seeking transfer of the PMLA case related to the smuggling of gold from Special PMLA Court, Ernakulam to Special PMLA Court in Karnataka. The agency said in its petition that the four accused persons in the case (M Sivasankar, PS Sarith, Swapna Suresh and Sandeep Nair)are highly influential and have close nexus with the top officials in the Kerala Government; as such, "free and fair trial" of the case is not possible in Kerala.

In October, 2022, the Court allowed an impleadment application filed by State of Kerala in the present case and gave it time to file a reply.

Case Title: Directorate of Enforcement v. Sarith PS and Others | TP (Crl) 449/2022