The Delhi High Court Wednesday allowed Chinese smartphone maker Vivo to operate its various bank accounts frozen by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with a money-laundering probe subject to furnishing of a bank guarantee of ₹ 950 crore within a week with the agency.
Justice Yashwant Varma also directed the company to give details to ED about its remittances and issued notice to the investigating agency on Vivo’s plea seeking quashing of the order freezing its various bank accounts.
ED contended that presently the proceeds of crime have been quantified to ₹ 1200 crore.
The high court also asked the company to maintain a balance of ₹ 251 crore in the bank accounts, which was there at the time of freezing of the accounts, and the amount shall not be used till further orders.
The court granted one week to the ED to file its response to the petition and listed the matter for further hearing on July 28.
Besides seeking quashing of the freezing order, Vivo has sought permission to deal with its frozen bank accounts for making payments towards certain liabilities.
The probe agency on July 5 raided several places across the country in the money laundering investigation against Vivo and related firms.
The searches were carried out under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in several states, including Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Meghalaya, and Maharashtra
On July 8, the high court directed ED to attend to a representation made by Vivo seeking permission to deal with its frozen bank accounts for making payments towards certain liabilities.
On Wednesday, ED’s counsel informed the court that the representation was general in nature and thereafter, they asked the company to give some more documents which were made available to the agency on Tuesday in a pen drive containing 5GB of data.
The agency’s counsel said in the representation, that a claim was made that payments of ₹ 2,826 crore have to be made under various heads but not even a single document was placed in support.
He said the agency needs at least one week to go through the data in the pen drive and added that the searches have been completed now and the relevant material has been sent to the adjudicating authority.
Vivo’s counsel contended that ED can only seize what they have discovered in their search operations and not the company’s bank accounts which were already disclosed to all the authorities.