NSE phone tapping case: Delhi HC grants bail to Ex-Mumbai Police chief Sanjay Pandey

The Delhi High Court on Thursday granted bail to Ex Mumbai Police Commissioner Sanjay Pandey in the National Stock Exchange phone tapping and snooping case registered by the Enforcement Directorate EDThe Bench of Justice Jasmeet Singh on Thursday said that Sanjay Pandeys bail plea is allowed with some conditions Pandey was arrested by the ED under money laundering charges in the case and is presently in judicial custodyPandey was represented in the matter by Senior Advocate Mukul Rohatgi along with Aditya Wadhwa and Siddharth Sunil AdvocatesIn August the trial court had denied him bail in the matter and said that considering the broad probability based on the material placed before the court the involvement of the accused in the offence of money laundering as defined by the Apex Court cannot be ruled outFurthermore the applicantSanjay Pandey was the top cop of Mumbai police till 30062022 hence apprehension of Investigating agency Prosecution that the applicant may influence the witnesses or tamper with the evidence is not unfounded said the trial court while denying him bailIn bail plea before the trial court Pandey stated that he had investigated and prosecuted several highprofile and politically sensitive cases and the instant proceedings are a political fallout of honest and sincere discharge of his duties as a senior police officerAlso Read Female leopard found dead in Yeoor forest died of natural causes say officialsThe instant case is clearly motivated by political considerations It is also evident from the fact that an offence that allegedly occurred between 2009 and 2017 is being investigated in 2022 ie thirteen years after its purported commencement and five years after its purported closure and that too within a week of the Applicant demitting his office stated Sanjay Pandeys bail petitionPandeys lawyer submitted that the huge delay in the registration of the said FIR raises serious doubts as to the bonafide of the investigation It appears that the applicant Sanjay Pandey is arraigned in the present case for no fault of his own and only to fulfil some political vendettaFor the ED Additional Solicitor General ASG SV Raju and Special Public Prosecutor Naveen Kumar Matta had appeared and submitted that Pandey resigned in April 2000 and there was litigation between 20012006 over his service VRS moved in 2007 and in October 2008 and he withdrew that He formed a company incorporated in 2001 when this was incorporated he was still in service even if he was not the director of the company he attended the meeting We have records defacto he was in control ED further submitted that the contract came in as facade 120B is a predicate offense criminal conspiracy held MTNL lines were tapped This company was a family concern and 454 crores were proceeds of crimeThe agencys move comes after it reportedly found enough evidence in the NSE colocation scam in which it wanted to know the role of an audit company incorporated in 2001 by the retired Mumbai Police chief for raising a red flag that the NSE servers were compromised The compromise had allowed one of the trading companies to get unfair access to the system resulting in windfall profitsThe case is already being probed by the Central Bureau of Investigation CBI since 2018It is alleged that the firm incorporated by Pandey was one of the IT companies tasked with conducting security audits at NSE from 2010 to 2015 when the colocation scam is believed to have taken placeThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever