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Informist, Tuesday, Sep 3, 2024

 

NEW DELHI – The Delhi High Court has issued a notice to the Enforcement Directorate following a plea by Religare Enterprises Ltd's Chairperson Rashmi Saluja, group general counsel Nishant Singhal, and arm Religare Finvest Ltd Chief Operating Officer Chirag Jain. The plea came after the probe agency last month searched the premises of Saluja, Jain, Singhal and other executives in connection with a case of cheating and criminal conspiracy to defraud shareholders of Religare Enterprises.

 

Advocate Mukul Rohagi, who appeared for the petitioners, said that they had been unnecessarily harassed at the instance of rivals. Rohatgi said that an order has been passed by the agency freezing any debit transaction in the dematerialisation account in the name of Saluja. No such order could have been passed without recording satisfaction that the shares in the demat account were proceeds of the crime or are involved in money laundering in any manner whatsoever, said Rohatgi. The freezing of the shares would have an adverse effect and, in case the prices of the shares fall, the probe agency was not going to compensate, he added.

 

Rohatgi said that the agency initiated the probe after a first information report was registered over allegations that the accused were siphoning off money from Religare Enterprises. He said that the allegations were made by a complainant, who claimed that he had purchased 500 shares of the said company at 239 rupees each and the share prices had started falling thereafter. Rohatgi said that Jain and Singhal were not named in the FIR. The high court will hear the case next on Oct 23.

 

The FIR lists 14 people as accused, including the erstwhile promoters of Religare Enterprises, four acquirer companies of the Burman group, which made the open offer for Religare Enterprises, and members of the Burman family. The Burman family, the largest shareholder in Religare Enterprises, is currently embroiled in a conflict with the company's chairperson over the change of control at the financial firm in key licences for insurance, lending and broking business. Today, shares of Religare Enterprises ended 1.1% lower at 268.10 rupees on the National Stock Exchange.  End

 

Reported by Surya Tripathi

Edited by Aditya Sakorkar

 

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