The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Tuesday filed a chargesheet against Congress MPs Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, along with Sam Pitroda, head of the party's overseas unit, in the alleged National Herald money laundering case, NDTV reported.
A special court has scheduled the next hearing for April 25.
"The present prosecution complaint shall next be taken up for consideration, on the aspect of cognisance... when Special Counsel for the ED and the Investigating Officer shall also ensure production of the case diaries for perusal by the court," stated Special Judge Vishal Gogne.
This marks the first time Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi have been chargesheeted in the case.
Meanwhile, Jairam Ramesh on X said: "Seizing the assets of the National Herald is a state-sponsored crime masquerading as the rule of law.
Filing chargesheets against Smt. Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi, and some others is nothing but the politics of vendetta and intimidation by the PM and the HM gone completely berserk.
The INC and its leadership will not be silenced. Satyameva Jayate."
Congress leader Supriya Shrinate said to ANI, "This bogus case has been going on for the last 12 years. And it is ridiculous that the money laundering chargesheet filed by the ED is in a case in which not a single penny has been transacted, in which not a single property has been transferred. This is pure, dirty, vulgar, cheap and vendetta politics. If Narendra Modi ji thinks he will scare people with this, there must be some people who are scared of you. Rahul Gandhi, Sonia Gandhi and the Congress party are neither scared of you nor intimidated by you. They will continue to fight for the rights of the people with all their might..."
Senior Advocate and Congress MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi also said to ANI, "...This will be contested fully in all aspects... I think the government, by such matters, is only exposing itself and its campaign of political vendetta because there is absolutely nothing in this case in a legal sense."
What is National Herald?
The National Herald newspaper was started by India's first Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru in 1938 from Lucknow. It was part of the independence movement against the British.
Associated Journals Limited (AJL), which published National Herald along with 'Qaumi Awaz' in Urdu and 'Navjeevan' in Hindi, did not belong to any one person but was founded in 1937 with 5,000 other freedom fighters as its shareholders, as per Business Standard. There were 1,057 shareholders in 2010.
The Gandhi Link
Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi are majority shareholders of Young Indian Ltd (YIL) which later acquired AJL. Rahul and Sonia Gandhi together had 76 percent of ownership.
The ED claimed its investigation has "conclusively" found that Young Indian, a private company "beneficially owned" by Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi, "acquired" AJL properties worth rupees 2,000 crore for a mere rupees 50 lakh, significantly undervaluing its worth.
Subramanian Swamy's Complaint
The ED investigation began in 2021 after the Metropolitan Magistrate at Patiala House Courts in Delhi took cognisance of a private complaint filed by BJP leader Subramanian Swamy on June 26, 2014.
Swamy in 2014 filed a complaint alleging some Congress leaders, including the Gandhis, were involved in cheating and breach of trust in the acquisition of Associated Journals Ltd (AJL) by Young Indian Ltd (YIL) in 2011, as per a report by the Business Standard.
AJL published the National Herald newspaper in English, Qaumi Awaz in Urdu, and Navjeevan in Hindi until 2008, when it was shut down after running into losses.
The Congress party granted a rupees 90 crore interest-free loan to the AJL to help it, but it could not be revived, and AJL failed to repay the loan to the Congress, according to The Financial Express.
Under the Income Tax Act, no political organisation can have financial transactions with a third party. In 2010, AJL declared the loan cannot be paid and transferred the loan to YIL. In lieu of it, AJL also issued its shares to YIL, giving YIL control of 99 per cent of AJL and its real estate assets. YIL paid a further consideration of Rs 50 lakh to AJL.
The report added that the Congress party wrote off the loan given to AJL as unrecoverable.
This meant, as per the complaint, that YIL ended up having the control of AJL and its real-estate assets for rupees 50 lakh on a rupees 90 lakh loan that Congress party wrote off.
Case Goes Beyond Newspaper
The real estate, pegged at around rupees 2,000 crore, owned by AJL in cities such as Delhi, Mumbai, Patna, and Panchkula, is at the centre of the case.
By acquiring AJL, the Gandhis-owned YIL also acquired this real estate. The acquisition is controversial as they inherited such massive real estate in lieu of loan of 90 crore at a payment of rupees 50 lakh, as per Swamy's complaint.
