Delhi HC Grants Anticipatory Bail to NewsClick Founder in ED, EOW Cases
The Delhi High Court on Wednesday, July 23, 2025, granted anticipatory bail to NewsClick founder and editor-in-chief Prabir Purkayastha in two separate cases, one filed by the Enforcement Directorate for alleged money laundering and the other by the Delhi Police’s Economic Offences Wing over foreign funding.
A bench led by Justice Neena Bansal Krishna pronounced the judgement today.
A detailed copy of the judgment is awaited.
On July 7, 2021, the High Court had granted Purkayastha interim protection from arrest and directed him to join the investigation.
The Enforcement Directorate conducted raids at the office of NewsClick after the Delhi Police’s Economic Offences Wing registered an FIR in August 2020. The agency alleged that NewsClick received foreign funds disguised as foreign direct investment to promote pro-China propaganda through its stories.
In its plea before the High Court, the agency stated,"In light of further investigation in the matter, additional material has been revealed which discloses the commission of the offence of money laundering as well as the commission of a scheduled offence, which has been intimated to the predicate agency by way of an appropriate communication under Section 66(2) of the PMLA. The relevant facts will be produced in a sealed cover before this Hon’ble Court during the course of the hearing, as it is a subject matter of ongoing investigation.”
As per the FIR filed by the EOW, a case was registered under Sections 406, 420, and 120B of the IPC, and an investigation was launched. During the investigation, the sleuths gathered evidence indicating criminal acts.
“The accused persons, in conspiracy with their accomplices based abroad, devised a deceitful scheme to obtain and receive funds for undertaking activities as per instructions from their foreign-based benefactors by disguising the funds received as Foreign Direct Investment”, EOW stated.
It also added that the accused persons in furtherance of their scheme, converted their entity into a private limited company and got their valuation inflated through manipulation of the valuation criteria and process, so as to use the inflated valuation to get foreign investment purportedly in lieu of dilution of their shareholding in favour of the foreign investors.
The EOW informed that after seeking protection from arrest, petitioner Prabir Purkayastha joined the investigation and he merely provided the balance sheet of PPK NewsClick Studio Pvt. Ltd. for the financial year 2017-2018, 2018-2019, 2019-2020 but failed to provide closures of the balance sheets to check their source of revenue, expenditures, end use of funds, FDI and fund/revenue from foreign entities.
“The petitioner or accused also failed to provide information on what kind of export services were provided by their company PPK NewsClick Studio Pvt. Ltd. to the foreign entities against the fee/remittances paid by them” it stated.
Case Title: Prabir Purkayastha v. Directorate of Enforcement (another connected matter)
Judgement Date: 23 July 2025
Bench: Justice Neena Bansal Krishna