New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday questioned the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on the practice of allowing a single member of the PMLA adjudicating authority to decide cases involving attachment of properties, asking whether there could be genuine application of mind when thousands of matters had to be dealt with within the statutory 180-day period.
The court underlined that attachment of property under the anti-money laundering law has serious civil consequences and cannot be treated as a routine administrative exercise. The exchange took place during the hearing of a batch of petitions raising questions over the functioning of adjudicating authorities under PMLA. One of the petitions, filed by M/s Karvy Realty (India) Ltd, challenges a 2024 Telangana high court ruling which held that a single-member adjudicating authority could exercise powers under Section 8 of PMLA even if that member did not have legal experience. The petitioners argued that the statutory scheme contemplated a judicial element in the adjudication of attachment proceedings, particularly since the Supreme Court had upheld the constitutional validity of PMLA in Vijay Madanlal Choudhary Vs Union of India (2022) while taking note of the safeguards built into the adjudicatory mechanism. The court’s concern, however, centred on whether the statutory 180-day timeline itself could undermine the quality of adjudication if a single member was required to handle a large volume of attachment proceedings. He referred to data on the authority’s website showing that 8,851 cases had been initiated by ED, of which only 60 had reached trial, and said there were more than 3,000 attachment orders.
“Will there be real application of mind or signing on the dotted lines?” , the Chief Justice of India Surya Kant-led bench asked during a hearing on whether a single member, particularly one without judicial experience, could confirm provisional property attachments made by ED under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). Senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, appearing for one of the petitioners, told the court that the adjudicating authority had for a considerable period functioned with only a single member.
“The intent of the legislature is bestowed on one tribunal and attachment is the heart and soul of any investigation under PMLA. Will it not make the power illusory as there would hardly be any application of mind?” the bench asked.
