Institute of Legal and Management Studies

Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal on Monday (August 4) requested Chief Justice of India to list the petitions seeking the larger bench reference of the 'Vijay Madanlal Choudhary' judgment (which upheld the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act) along with the review petitions against the said judgment, which are scheduled to be heard on August 6.

Solicitor General of India Tushar Mehta however opposed the request, saying that the petitioners were attempting to expand the limited scope of the review.

CJI BR Gavai agreed to speak with Justice Surya Kant, who is heading the bench hearing the PMLA review, regarding the listing of the reference pleas.

Sibal was referring to the matter Directorate of Enforcement v. M/s Obulapuram Mining Company Private Limited | Criminal Appeal No. 1269 of 2017, in which a three bench was constituted to decide whether the 'Vijay Madanlal Choudhary' judgment should be referred to a larger bench. The bench, which comprising Justice SK Kaul, Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Bela M Trivedi, had heard the matter on several occasions. In November 2023, the bench was dissolved in view of the retirement of Justice Kaul and the matter did not get listed after that.

Later, the review petitions filed against the 'Vijay Madanlal Choudhary' were listed before a bench led by Justice Surya Kant. Last week, the bench agreed to hear the matter on August 6 for preliminary objections. When Sibal made a request before the Justice Kant-led bench for listing the 'Obulapuram Mining Company' as well, Justice Kant told Sibal to make a mention before the CJI.

Today, mentioning the matter, Sibal said, "The review petitions in the PMLA matter are listed for hearing on August 6th and 7th. There was another 3-judge bench qua the PMLA matter where hearing could not be completed since Justice Kaul retired. I mentioned it to the other bench. They said mention it before your lordships for both the matters to be heard together."

"If your review is decided, this will also be covered," CJI BR Gavai.

"Those matters were for the purposes of finding out which of the matters should be referred to the larger bench," Sibal said.

SG Mehta then objected, saying that by mentioning, the petitioners were trying to overcome the order passed by Justice Kant's bench last week, as per which the ED's preliminary objections to the maintainability of review will be heard first. "In review notice was issued on a limited ground. To come out of that, they started filing other petitions raising all grounds," SG said.

Sibal then said that there was an order passed in the other bench allowing the petitioners to raise additional grounds to decide the points of reference. "Why should both the matters be heard differently?" Sibal asked.

"Suppose if review itself is found to be maintainable.."CJI asked.

"I can still argue this (reference). Because review is a limited jurisdiction. I can still argue some of the issues should be referred to larger bench," Sibal replied.

"I will speak to the learned judge," CJI Gavai said.