india

Updated: Jul 04, 2020 20:53 IST

Days after Congress president Sonia Gandhi and former prime minister Dr Manmohan Singh visited former finance minister P Chidambaram at Tihar, the Congress on Thursday sent a team of its top leaders Ahmed Patel, Anand Sharma and DK Suresh to meet Karnataka Congress leader DK Shivakumar.

DK Shivakumar, who was the Congress’ lead troubleshooter in Karnataka, was arrested by the federal probe agency to track money laundering, Enforcement Directorate, on September 3. He was also sent to Tihar jail after his custodial interrogation by the ED ended.

The show of solidarity comes just a day after Special CBI judge Ajay Kumar Kuhar rejected his request for bail. In his order, the judge had pointed to documents about his assets including a list of 317 bank accounts and other documents of properties and ruled that the probe was still at an early stage to let him walk out.

“We inquired about his welfare… We strongly feel that what is being done to him is unfair,” senior Congress leader Anand Sharma told reporters after meeting Shivakumar, according to news agency ANI.

“There is an issue of his personal liberty, his health and fundamental rights. We hope the court does justice,” Sharma said.

DK Shivakumar’s legal team is appealing to the Delhi High Court against the CBI special judge’s rejection of his bail. Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Dayan Krishnan, who had appeared for DK Shivakumar in the Delhi court, had argued that the 57-year-old politician had undergone angiography and had also been admitted to the hospital four times during his custody.

The court, however, ruled that “medical ground by itself” was not a justified ground for bail in view of the charges against him. It had asked Tihar jail to ensure that all medical needs of Shivakumar were met with.

In September last year, the ED had registered the money laundering case against Shivakumar, Haumanthaiah, an employee at the Karnataka Bhavan in New Delhi, and others.

The case was based on a charge sheet filed by the Income Tax Department against them last year that accused him of alleged tax evasion and ‘hawala’ transactions worth crores.

Shivakumar has been on the radar of the Income Tax Department and the ED since demonetisation in 2016. An I-T search at his New Delhi flat on August 2, 2017 led to the seizure of Rs 8.59 crore of unaccounted cash. The I-T Department lodged cases against him and his four associates under sections 277 and 278 of the I-T Act, 1961 and sections 120(B), 193 and 199 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).