{"id":31827,"date":"2024-11-07T18:09:10","date_gmt":"2024-11-07T12:39:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=31827"},"modified":"2024-11-07T18:09:12","modified_gmt":"2024-11-07T12:39:12","slug":"prior-sanction-required-to-prosecute-public-servants-for-money-laundering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/07-11-2024\/prior-sanction-required-to-prosecute-public-servants-for-money-laundering","title":{"rendered":"Prior Sanction Required to Prosecute Public Servants for Money Laundering"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/ Polity and Governance<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Supreme Court held that a prior sanction will precede the prosecution of public servants accused of money laundering charges in discharge of official duty.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Background<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The Supreme Court dismissed a plea by the Enforcement Directorate (ED), which had challenged a high court verdict that quashed the cognisance order on the agency&#8217;s complaint against two IAS officers.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The decision reinforced the application of <strong>Section 197(1) of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC)<\/strong> in PMLA cases.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Section 197(1) <\/strong>mandates that no prosecution against a public servant can proceed without obtaining prior sanction from the competent authority.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The provision corresponds to <strong>Section 218 of the Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-table\"><table class=\"has-background\" style=\"background-color:#fff2cc\"><tbody><tr><td><strong>What is Money Laundering?<\/strong><br>&#8211; <strong>Money laundering is the illegal process <\/strong>of making large amounts of money generated by criminal activity, such as drug trafficking or terrorist funding, appear to have come from a legitimate source.\u00a0<br>1. <strong>In terrorism financing<\/strong> the funds were used to procure arms and ammunition and for training the cadres of the violent extremist organization, among other purposes.\u00a0<br>&#8211; The money from the criminal activity is considered dirty, and the process \u201claunders\u201d it to make it look clean.<br><strong>Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) 2002<\/strong><br>&#8211; <strong>\u00a0<\/strong>It was enacted by Parliament of India under <strong>Article 253 of Constitution in 2002<\/strong> to prevent money laundering and provide for the confiscation of property derived from or involved in money laundering.<br>&#8211; PMLA and the Rules notified there under came into force with effect from<strong> 2005, <\/strong>and it was further <strong>amended in 2009 and in 2012.<\/strong><br><strong>Provisions:<\/strong><br>&#8211; <strong>Sec. 3 of PMLA defines the offense of money laundering<\/strong> as any process or activity connected with the proceeds of crime and projecting it as untainted property.<br>&#8211; <strong>Prescribe obligation: <\/strong>PMLA prescribes the obligation of banking companies, financial institutions and intermediaries for verification and maintenance of records of the identity of all its clients.\u00a0<br>&#8211; <strong>Empowerment of officers: <\/strong>PMLA empowers <strong>Directorate of Enforcement<\/strong> to carry out investigations in cases involving offense of money laundering and also to attach the property involved in money laundering.\u00a0<br>&#8211; <strong>Special Courts:<\/strong> It envisages the designation of one or more courts of sessions as Special Court to try the offenses punishable under PMLA.\u00a0<br>&#8211; <strong>Agreement for Central Government:<\/strong> It allows the Central Government to enter into an agreement with the Government of any country outside India for enforcing the provisions of the PMLA.<\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Conclusion<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>By applying Section 197(1) to PMLA prosecutions, the court created a <strong>check against arbitrary or politically motivated prosecutions<\/strong> of public servants.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>It emphasized PMLA\u2019s Section 65, which makes the CrPC applicable to PMLA procedures unless inconsistent with PMLA\u2019s provisions.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source:&nbsp; <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/indianexpress.com\/article\/india\/sanction-needed-under-pmla-to-prosecute-public-servants-sc-9657277\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong>IE<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Supreme Court held that a prior sanction will precede the prosecution of public servants accused of money laundering charges in discharge of official duty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31827","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31827","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31827"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31827\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31828,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31827\/revisions\/31828"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31827"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31827"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31827"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}