NEW DELHI: Enforcement Directorate has moved Supreme Court against the Delhi high court’s order quashing the money-laundering case against digital news platform NewsClick and its founder-editor Prabir Purkayastha, alleging that the HC committed a grave error by quashing the 2020 ECIR without examining the allegations against them.The directorate, which filed an appeal almost five months after the HC pronounced the order on May 29, also took the ground that the HC passed the order five months and 26 days after the judgement was reserved and it was in violation of SC’s guidelines that the verdict should be delivered within three months. “That, from a reading of the judgment it appears that due to the lapse of such period in pronouncing the judgment, several critical contentions raised by the prosecution were overlooked or left unaddressed by the high court,” the agency said.
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Giving details of the financial transaction of the news portal, it said the company was incorporated upon conversion from M/s PP Newsclick Studio LLP on Jan 11, 2018 and within three months, a loss-making company with hardly any assets received FDI worth Rs 9.6 crore by selling its shares for a premium at Rs 11,510/- per share.“PPK’s balance sheet for the FY 2018-19 reveals that it had assets worth only Rs 57 lakhs (approx.) and the company had suffered huge losses varying from Rs 37.8 lakh in FY 2017-18 to Rs.6.61 crore in FY 2018-19. No reason for any genuine investor to pay Rs. 11,510/- per share for a share whose face value was only Rs 10 at the time of allotment only 3 months back,” the appeal said.