PMLA court grants bail to MIAL MD Sanjay Reddy, six others

The special PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) court on Wednesday granted bail to GV Sanjay Reddy, managing director (MD) of Mumbai International Airport Pvt Ltd (MIAL), and six others named by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case, on provisional cash security of ₹5 lakh each.

The special PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) court on Wednesday granted bail to GV Sanjay Reddy, managing director (MD) of Mumbai International Airport Pvt Ltd (MIAL), and six others named by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case, on provisional cash security of ₹5 lakh each. ED had filed a detailed charge sheet in the matter in the last week of August naming seven accused and 14 companies.

The court then granted bail to GV Sanjay Reddy, managing director (MD) of Mumbai International Airport Pvt Ltd (MIAL), along with Raghuram Kesaram, Sudhindra Kumar, Krishnam Raju, Jagan Mohan Rao, Anicattulssac George and Chandra Mouli Yarra — officials of MIAL and GVK Airports Developers Ltd.

Special PMLA judge MG Deshpande, who had taken cognisance of the ED charge sheet, had issued process against all the accused and asked them to be present before it on September 22.

The accused were represented by advocates Vijay Aggarwal and Rahul Aggarwal who sought bail for the accused and pointed out that ED has not arrested them in the case.

The court then granted bail to Reddy along with Raghuram Kesaram, Sudhindra Kumar, Krishnam Raju, Jagan Mohan Rao, Anicattulssac George and Chandra Mouli Yarra — officials of MIAL and GVK Airports Developers Ltd.

The court asked them to deposit their passports with the agency and asked to attend trial. It has also asked the accused to not tamper with evidence.

Apart from the seven individuals, ED has named 14 companies including MIAL, GVK Airport Developers Ltd, GVK Developers Project Pvt Ltd, and GVK Energy Ltd.

The Airports Authority of India (AAI), which managed the city airport, had entered into an agreement with MIAL in 2006, allowing them to operate, manage and develop Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport (CSMIA). Accordingly, MIAL was to share 38.7% earnings with AAI and keep the rest for modernisation and extension of the airport.

ED had alleged that MIAL inflated expenditure by paying GVK employees’ salary from its revenues. IT allegedly also rented out premium retail areas in Mumbai airport to family members, relatives and employees of GVK at very low rates, thereby reducing revenues. In this way, ₹705 crore were fraudulently siphoned off from MIAL, resulting loss to AAI and corresponding wrongful gain to GVK Airports Holding Ltd.

The agency has alleged MIAL had allegedly entered into bogus contract of ₹310 crore during 2017-2018 with nine firms/companies, but against the same, no work was executed.

In addition, overdraft facility against surplus funds totalling ₹395 crore were remaining with MIAL after sharing revenue with AAl and deducting expenses kept as fixed deposit receipts (FDR) with public sector undertaking (PSU) banks, which it diverted to other group of companies.