The Central government Wednesday told the Delhi High Court that there was enough material on record to register an FIR against Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh in a money laundering case.Appearing before Chief Justice G. Rohini and Justice Jayant Nath, Additional Solicitor General (ASG) Sanjay Jain said that "there is a clear case of money laundering"."Prima facie there is enough material on record to register an FIR (against Singh) and it is for the CBI to explain why it is holding back the case. It's a clear case of money laundering," said the ASG. The court was hearing a PIL filed by NGO Common Cause through advocate Prashant Bhushan seeking a CBI inquiry into the corruption allegations against Singh when he was union steel minister.
There are allegations of corruption, money laundering and possession of assets disproportionate to known sources of his income against Singh.Bhushan told the court there were some recent instances of money laundering and corruption by Virbhadra Singh's family members. The CBI initiated a preliminary inquiry one-and-a-half years ago but it has gone nowhere, argued Bhushan. The court posted the matter for Aug 20 when it will have a look at the status report filed by the CBI. The court also asked the income tax department to file a status report.The plea stated that there were several primary documents like income tax returns and affidavits filed with nomination papers linking the Congress leader to "dubious transactions" and investments involving large sums of money when he was a minister in the central government.It said that even the allegations fully supported by primary documents and which have been in the public domain for months were not probed.
The plea sought direction to the CBI and the income tax department to initiate an investigation under the supervision of the court or the CVC into the charges of "money laundering, corruption, possession of disproportionate assets, criminal misconduct against Virbhadra Singh".The petition said Virbhadra Singh filed I-T returns for assessment years 2009-10, 2010-11 and 2011-12, showing agricultural income of Rs.7,35,000, Rs.15,00,000 and Rs.25,00,000, respectively. This income is exempt under the I-T Act."In 2012, in order to explain the unaccounted money, Virbhadra Singh filed revised I-T returns for assessment year 2009-10, 2010-11 and 2011-12 showing revised agricultural income, showing an increase of 18 to 30 fold of income in the three years.""The total increase in agricultural income amounted to Rs.6.1 crore," the petition said.