The Delhi high court on Tuesday dismissed the plea of the Enforcement Directorate seeking cancellation of bail granted to businessman Ratul Puri in the AgustaWestland money laundering case.
The order dismissing the plea was passed by Justice Suresh Kumar Kait.
Last month, the ED had moved the High Court challenging the grant of bail to Puri by a special CBI court in the money laundering case.
A special CBI court had granted bail to Puri, who is the nephew of Madhya Pradesh CM Kamal Nath, on a bail bond of Rs 5 lakh and two sureties of like amount.
In his order, Special CBI Judge Arvind Kumar had told Puri not to tamper with evidence or make contact with or influence any witness pertaining to the case.
The judge had directed Puri to join the probe and extend cooperation to the investigating officer.
Puri is facing an ED investigation for allegedly being involved in money laundering through his companies in the AgustaWestland chopper scam.
The investigating agency has alleged that accounts related to firms owned and governed by Puri were used to collect kickbacks in the helicopter deal.
The investigating agency has recently filed a supplementary prosecution complaint against Puri and his associate Jaspreet Ahuja.
Puri was arrested by on August 18 last year after the ED took cognisance of the disclosures made by lobbyist Rajiv Saxena, also an accused in the case.
Saxena had turned approver in the case after he was extradited from the United Arab Emirates and detained by the agency.
The case pertains to alleged irregularities in the purchase of 12 VVIP choppers from Italy-based Finmeccanica’s British subsidiary AgustaWestland. The deal was scrapped by the NDA government in 2014 over the alleged breach of contractual obligations and charges of payment of kickbacks for securing the deal.
Puri is the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Hindustan Powerprojects, one of India’s leading power players in the energy sector.