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Calcutta High Court has directed ED and CBI to submit money realised from the sale of proceeds in attachments made in Saradha scam to the one-man committee.
The Calcutta High Court has recently directed the Central Bureau of Investigation and Enforcement Directorate to submit the money collected by selling properties of Saradha Group of Companies to the committee headed by former Justice SP Talukdar.
Up till 2013, the West Bengal, Assam, and Orissa states are where the Saradha group is said to have operated chit fund activities. Over Rs 2,459 crore was raised in total by the accused company, of which Rs 1,983 crore has yet not been reimbursed to the depositors.
A bench of Justice IP Mukerji and Justice Subhendu Samanta was informed by the counsel appearing for the petitioners that diverse authorities like CBI, ED, State government, etc. have in their possession some funds belonging to the company.
If the entire fund including the sale proceeds realized by SEBI are handed over to the one-man committee then that fund can be centralized and dealt with by the committee according to the directions to be passed by it, the division bench was further told.
After considering said submissions, Court said that the one-man committee headed by Mr. Justice S.P. Talukdar(retired), shall deal with the matter and all funds belonging to the company after deduction of all expenses and fees etc. shall be deposited with the one-man committee or in any bank according to its directions.
The bench has further directed SEBI to sell the property of the company through its usual procedure. Additionally, the bench allowed the applicants to make their respective offers.
On receipt of all the offers, the SEBI will be at liberty either to accept the highest offer or conduct an auction to receive a higher offer. Thereafter, the authority will prepare a report and furnish it to a one-man committee, added the division bench.
The bench further held that the sale will have to be approved by the one-man committee.
The committee shall have the power to order re-advertisement or re-auction by SEBI or any other organization if the circumstances so warrant, and the offer accepted by the committee shall be placed before the High Court for confirmation and thereafter the same will become final, the bench conclusively ordered.
Case Title: Abdul Khalek Laskar & Anr. vs. Union of India & Ors.
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