Madras high court moved to register case against Vijay

CHENNAI: A resident of Kodungaiyur has moved the Madras high court seeking to register a cheating and money laundering case against chief minister-designate and TVK founder Vijay for alleged suppression of financial transactions and receipt of unaccounted cash as renumeration.

The first bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G Arul Murugan, through an order dated April 8, has directed the registry to list the case for deciding its maintainability. The order was released recently, and the case is likely to be taken up for hearing after the summer vacation of the court.

The petitioner, M Rajkumar, wanted the court to direct the income tax department to examine the materials and findings recorded in the search proceedings conducted at Vijay’s residence on Sept 30, 2015, and the sworn statement recorded, the assessment proceedings, and the Rs 1.5 crore penalty order passed and initiate appropriate prosecution proceedings under the relevant provisions of the Income Tax Act.

He further wanted the court to direct the law enforcement authorities to register an FIR and conduct an investigation into the commission of cognizable offences under Sections 420 (cheating), 467 (forgery), 470, 471 and 120B (criminal conspiracy) of IPC, in relation to the suppression of income, receipt of unaccounted cash remuneration and concealment of financial transactions disclosed in the course of the search.

The court must also direct the I-T department to place the materials gathered during the search, assessment and penalty proceedings before the competent authorities under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), for the purpose of examining the existence of a scheduled predicate offence and proceeds of crime and to take appropriate steps for investigation in accordance with the provisions of PMLA, he added.

Since the high court registry refused to number the petition, it was brought to the notice of the court. Citing the judgement of the Supreme Court in the P Surendran case, the court pointed out that the power of judicial function cannot be delegated to the registry and that the registry is only bound to scrutinize the orderliness of the case papers filed by the litigants/lawyers.