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A public interest litigation (PIL) petition has been filed in the Madras High Court seeking the transfer of over 40 First Information Reports (FIRs) registered in connection with the Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation (TASMAC), from the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti-Corruption (DVAC) to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
A summer vacation Bench of Justices G.R. Swaminathan and V. Lakshminarayanan on Wednesday (May 14, 2025) ordered notices, returnable by next week, to the DVAC, CBI, as well as the Directorate of Enforcement (ED), which had taken up a money laundering probe on the basis of those FIRs registered between 2017 and 2024.
When the petitioners insisted on issuing a direction to the DVAC to file a status report during the next hearing, Advocate General P.S. Raman and Additional Advocate General J. Ravindran sought three weeks to file a detailed counter affidavit to the PIL petition. Justice Swaminathan asked the law officers to make their submissions next week and adjourned the matter to May 21, 2025.
K. Venkatachalapathy, a lawyer based in Tirunelveli, had filed the PIL petition, through his counsel on record, VR. Shanmuganathan. According to the petitioner, the FIRs had been booked against TASMAC employees and others for overpricing liquor, irregularities in the floating of tenders, and other such charges.
Claiming that they cumulatively involve a scam to the tune of ₹1,000 crore, the petitioner said that the ED had registered an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) on the basis of those FIRs and commenced a probe under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) of 2002.
The ED officials also conducted a search and seizure operation at the TASMAC headquarters in Chennai between March 6 and 8, 2025. However, the State government immediately filed a “frivolous” writ petition before the High Court, objecting to the seizure operation, but it was dismissed by the court, he said.
Wondering how the State government could object to a probe conducted by the central agency, instead of exhibiting interest in prosecuting the predicate offences against those involved in the malpractices, the petitioner said, he had reliably learnt that some of the FIRs had been closed recently.
Fearing that a free and fair investigation might not be conducted by the DVAC, the petitioner insisted that all those FIRs be transferred to the CBI. He also claimed to have made representations to the Centre as well as the CBI in this regard on May 1, 2025, and followed it up with a reminder on May 8, 2025.
Published – May 14, 2025 03:27 pm IST
