Congress leader Sonia Gandhi on Friday argued that Enforcement Directorate's (ED) National Herald case was "truly a strange" one.

Senior counsel Abhishek Manu Singhvi, representing the senior Congress leader, began his rebuttal after additional solicitor general S V Raju for ED on July 3 concluded his arguments on the point of cognisance of the chargesheet filed in the case.

"This is truly a strange case. More than strange. Unprecedented. This is an alleged case of money laundering, without any property, without use or projection of property. There was not an inch of property moved from Associated Journals Limited (AJL) to Young Indian. No Congress leader gets any property or money. Yet this is called money laundering," Singhvi argued.

The ED has accused Sonia and Rahul Gandhi, late Congress leaders Motilal Vora and Oscar Fernandes aside from Suman Dubey, Sam Pitroda and the private company Young Indian of conspiracy and money laundering over the fraudulent takeover of properties valued over Rs 2,000 crore belonging to the Associated Journals Limited (AJL), which published National Herald newspaper.

ED alleges Gandhis held the majority 76 per cent shares in Young Indian, which fraudulently usurped assets of AJL, in exchange for a Rs 90 crore loan.

Singhvi, however, submitted that the exercise was undertaken to make AJL debt free.

"Every company is entitled under law and does, every day, make their companies get free by a variety of instruments. So you take away the debt and assign it to another entity. So this company becomes debt free," Singhvi said.

He said that Young Indian was a not-for-profit company.

"Means it cannot give dividends, it cannot give perks, it cannot give salaries, it cannot give those bonuses. It can give nothing," the senior lawyer argued.

He said that Young Indian after investing money in the shares of AJL only had the right over the dividend and no interest was created on AJLs properties.

"How can Gandhis and Young Indian be treated as alter egos of AJL?" he asked.

Singhvi said the ED did not do anything for several years and instead picked up a private complaint.

"They are, obviously people associated with the Congress. To have the National Herald in a body not associated with the Congress would be worse than having Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark," he said.

Singhvi argued that ED sought "criminal cognisance of a draconian act" against Sonia.

"There is an 11-year gap between restructuring of AJL in 2010 and the registration of Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) in 2021. There cannot be a greater hiatus. There is also an eight year gap in the private complaint (filed by Subramanian Swamy) and the ECIR," he said.

He continued, "The ED has never done this in years. Picking up a private complaint years later and requesting the court to take cognisance." The judge then posed a question whether the Congress party had the right to write off the loan.

"There is no general inhibition in law which prevents a person from recovering debt. The law encourages non-performing assets (NPAs) to be eliminated by taking over the debt. Suppose the AJL debt was taken by Tatas or Birlas, then are Tatas and Birlas accused of money laundering? "The entire concept will collapse like this. They must be struck by madness to do money laundering with a not for profit company. This is what happens when politics has become uppermost and law becomes last," Singhvi argued.

The proceedings would continue on July 5 with rebuttal on behalf of Rahul Gandhi.

On July 3, Raju argued on the point of chargesheet's cognisance, saying the Gandhis were the "beneficial owners" of Young Indian and acquired its total control after the death of other shareholders.

The ED filed its chargesheet against the Gandhis and others under Sections 3 (money laundering) and 4 (punishment for money laundering) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

The chargesheet also names Dudey, Pitroda, Sunil Bhandari, Young Indian, and Dotex Merchandise Private Limited.

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