The Enforcement Directorate has filed a chargesheet against Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, among others, for alleged money laundering in the National Herald case, PTI reported on Tuesday.
The chargesheet also names Congress leader Sam Pitroda and Suman Dubey, a trustee of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, as persons accused in the matter, the news agency reported.
The chargesheet was filed on April 9 and was examined by special judge Vishal Gogne. He will hear the matter next on April 25 to consider taking cognisance of the chargesheet.
On Saturday, the ED said it had served notices to take possession of properties worth Rs 661 crore that it had attached as part of a money-laundering investigation against the National Herald newspaper.
The properties are located in Delhi, Mumbai and Lucknow.
The central investigative agency had attached the properties in November 2023 through a provisional attachment order issued in a case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. The case has been filed against the newspaper’s publisher, Associated Journals Limited and its holding company, Young Indian Private Limited.
Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are majority shareholders of Young Indian and hold 38% of its shares each.
The Enforcement Directorate said that the properties were attached “to secure the proceeds of crime and to prevent the accused from dissipating the same”.
On Tuesday, Congress leader Jairam Ramesh said that seizing the assets of the National Herald was a “state-sponsored crime masquerading as the rule of law”.
The filing of the chargesheet against Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, among others, was “nothing but the politics of vendetta and intimidation by the PM and the HM gone completely berserk”, Ramesh said on social media.
The Congress and leadership will not be silenced, he added.
The allegations
In April 2008, the National Herald, which was founded and edited by Jawaharlal Nehru before he became India’s first prime minister, suspended operations as it had incurred a debt of over Rs 90 crore.
Bharatiya Janata Party leader Subramanian Swamy filed a complaint against the newspaper in 2012, alleging that Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi set up Young Indian Private Limited to buy the debt using the funds from the party.
Swamy alleged that Young Indian paid only Rs 50 lakh to obtain the right to recover Rs 90.2 crore that the Associated Journals Limited owed to the Congress.
The Congress has claimed that there was no money exchange, and that only debt was converted into equity to pay off certain dues including employee salaries.