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High court quashes charges against key accused in Kerala gold smuggling case
The Kerala high court quashed the imposition of Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act against Swapna Suresh
Thiruvananthapuram: The Kerala high court on Friday quashed the imposition of Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act (Cofeposa) on Swapna Suresh, main accused in the gold smuggling case.
Her mother had moved the court three months ago seeking quashing of the continuous detention of her daughter under Cofeposa. In her petition, Swapna Suresh’s mother said Cofeposa can be applied on habitual offenders and that the gold smuggling case was first case against her.
A division bench of Justices A K Jayashankaran Nambiar and C P Mohammad Nias allowed the mother’s plea. Though Cofeposa was quashed, Swapna Suresh will remain in the judicial custody as many other cases are pending against her.
The Customs probing the gold smuggling case had invoked provisions of the Cofeposa against two accused in gold smuggling case, Swapna Suresh and Sandeep Nair, in October last year.
Sooraj T E, counsel of Suresh’s mother, said the preventive custody under Cofeposa was “illegal, arbitrary and vitiated by improper application of mind”. He said usually habitual offenders will come under its ambit and Suresh was wrongly included in the list. Later the court overruled the customs department’s objections and quashed Cofeposa charges.
The sensational gold smuggling case came to light in July 2020 after the seizure of 30 kg gold hidden in bathroom fittings in one of the consignments camouflaged as diplomatic baggage of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) consulate in state capital. The case was later handed over to the National Investigation Agency and it arrested Swapna Suresh and her accomplice Sandeep Nair from their hideout in Bangaluru.
Now a multi-agency team headed by the NIA is probing the case and 34 people have been arrested so far. One of the alleged key funders of the smuggling racket, Rabins Hameed, was extradited from the UAE and another key suspect Faizal Fareed is still at large. The case invited enough embarrassment to the Left front government after the CM’s principal secretary M Sivasankar, a senior IAS officer, was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate. Later he was suspended and he secured bail from the High Court later.
Though four central agencies (NIA, ED, DRI and Income Tax) are probing the case, other than initial arrests, investigation failed to make much headway, officials of the central agencies admit. Main beneficiaries and dispatchers are still at large and some politicians whose names cropped up in the course of investigation also remain untouched.
The union and state governments locked horns several times over the case and the latter even constituted a judicial commission against the Enforcement Directorate (ED), a first of its sort, alleging bid to implicate many senior leaders including CM Pinarayi Vijayan in the case. But later the HC had squashed the judicial commission.
