Christian Michel, the alleged middleman extradited and arrested in the AgustaWestland VVIP chopper scam, told a Delhi court on Friday that he had not named anybody in connection with the deal before the Enforcement Directorate.
Media reports have said the ED’s supplementary chargesheet, filed on Thursday, names “AP” and “FAM” apart from defence personnel, bureaucrats and journalists as the deal’s beneficiaries. The chargesheet says “AP” refers to senior Congress leader Ahmed Patel and “FAM” to “family”.
Last December, the ED had told the court that Michel had referred to a “Mrs Gandhi”, a “son of the Italian lady” and a certain “R” during questioning, but the agency did not explain the context of the purported remarks.
Michel, who alleges the Centre is using its investigative agencies for political purposes, moved court on Friday after the media reports came out. He has sought temporarily media curbs to protect his right to a fair trial, alleging the ED had “leaked” copies of the chargesheet to prejudice the case against him.
Michel’s counsel Aljo K. Joseph appeared with his client’s application before special judge Arvind Kumar, who issued a notice to the probe agency and sought its reply by Saturday.
“Michel has not named anyone in his statement before the agency, which is being leaked to the media. This is only to make the matter sensational and prejudice the case against my client,” Joseph said.
The plea by Michel, a British national, says his right to a free and fair trial overrides the media’s rights and the court can temporarily curtail the freedom of the media to ensure that.
It says that when the defence counsel sought copies of the supplementary chargesheet, filed on Thursday, the ED had refused, saying the court had not yet taken cognisance of it.
Yet, it says, “the ED has clandestinely provided a copy to the media houses which (are) publishing the same in instalments only to sensationalise the issue and prejudice the accused… even before cognisance was taken by this court”. It says that selective portions of the chargesheet have been published in the media, which make it clear that the ED was not interested in a fair court trial but only in a trial by media.
“(The) ED is making (a) mockery of the judicial process resulting in complete travesty of justice. The extradition treaty prohibited the extradition of accused involved in political offences and the government is now using the ED and all the investigating agencies for political purpose(s),” the plea says.
