The directorate argued that there were serious charges of hawala transactions against the meat exporter.

The Delhi High Court on Friday dismissed the plea of meat exporter and controversial businessman Moin Akhtar Qureshi against his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case.

A bench of Justices Vipin Sanghi and P.S. Teji agreed with the ED’s contention that there was “no illegality” in his arrest and that a petition of habeas corpus was not maintainable.

A habeas corpus plea is a petition which is filed to ensure that a person under arrest is brought before a court which will determine whether the detention is legal.

The Centre and the ED had opposed the plea, saying questioning of his arrest was an “abuse” of the legal process, claiming there were serious charges of hawala transactions against him.

The government had also refuted Qureshi’s allegations that he was unauthorisedly detained by the ED in the money laundering case, saying he was arrested under statutory provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and remanded to ED custody by a competent trial court.

Qureshi was arrested on August 25 and sent to ED custody by the trial court the next day for thorough probe in the case against him and others. He is presently in judicial custody.

The agency had claimed that “the witnesses have confirmed in their statements that they have delivered crores of rupees for Qureshi and his associates through his employees and one of the witnesses has stated that nearly Rs 1.75 crore have been exported by the accused from him and his friend in lieu of the help provided to him in a CBI case.”

Qureshi has been questioned several times in the past by ED which is probing his role following the registration of two FIRs under the PMLA, it had said.

The earlier PMLA case against Qureshi was lodged by the ED in 2015, based on an I-T prosecution complaint, ED had said.