ED Alleges ₹2000 Cr Scam in National Herald Case, Sonia-Rahul Under Lens

In the National Herald case, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday made serious allegations against the Congress leadership in a special court in Delhi. The ED claims that the Congress party conspired to grab the property worth about Rs 2000 crore of Associated Journals Limited (AJL) by paying just Rs 50 lakh. For this, the Congress formed a new company named 'Young India', whose real purpose was only to execute the plan of fraud and possession.

Additional Solicitor General V. Raju, appearing on behalf of the ED, told the court that the 'Young India' company was running in loss, it had neither property nor source of income, yet it took control of a historic institution like AJL. ED also said that Young India did not issue any tender and directly took over the company by paying Rs 50 lakh.

Court's questions and ED's answer
The court raised the question that if Young India knew that AJL did not have the capacity to repay the loan, was it so "naive" that it entered into a loss-making deal? The court also said that AJL is an old institution which has had a long association with the Gandhi family, then why and how did Young India acquire it?

ED's answer to this was that this is not a case of history but of misuse of money. The investigating agency said that till now they do not have enough evidence to make the Congress party (AICC) a direct accused, but they can be made accused in the future.

Allegation of funding through shell companies
ED claimed that Young India did not have money of its own, so it raises a loan of Rs 1 crore through shell companies based in Kolkata. Even though the balance sheet of the transaction was negative, it got a loan and with this money, AJL's assets were transferred to Young India. After this, Young India became a holding company and AJL started functioning as a subsidiary company.

Sonia-Rahul had control

According to the ED chargesheet, Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi had direct control over Young India. Both of them had 76% shares of the company and all the operational decisions were taken by them. ED also said that if AICC is made an accused in this case, then action can be taken against Rahul and Sonia Gandhi under Section 70 of the Enforcement Directorate Act.

ED will have to answer in the next hearing

The court asked ED who were the partners in AJL before 2010, when Young India was not even formed. On this, the agency has been asked to answer by Thursday.