Delhi Waqf Board Case: Court Reserves Order on ED’s Plea against Amanatullah Khan

Delhi’s Rouse Avenue Court has reserved its order on an application submitted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) against AAP MLA Amanatullah Khan for avoiding summons in a money laundering case concerning purported irregularities in appointments made by the Delhi Waqf Board.

Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Divya Malhotra is scheduled to determine on April 9 whether to summon Khan to address the ED’s petition. The federal investigative agency has asserted that Khan has escalated his involvement from a witness to an accused in the case by lodging an anticipatory bail plea and evading the investigation.

The ED, represented by Special Public Prosecutor Simon Benjamin, also affirmed that the agency is unable to conclude the investigation against Khan due to his non-appearance before it. “All the other individuals are associates of this specific person. His involvement is more significant than the other accused individuals who have already been arrested and charged,” he stated. Khan, the AAP’s Okhla MLA, was not implicated as an accused in a recent chargesheet filed by the ED. The agency has mentioned five entities in its prosecution complaint (the ED’s equivalent of a chargesheet), including three suspected associates of Khan — Zeeshan Haider, Daud Nasir, and Jawed Imam Siddiqui.

After conducting raids on premises connected to Khan and others in October of last year, the agency claimed that the AAP MLA had obtained “substantial proceeds of crime” in cash through the unlawful recruitment of staff at the Delhi Waqf Board. These proceeds were allegedly invested in purchasing immovable assets in the names of his associates during his tenure as the Board’s chairperson. The searches were carried out in connection with the alleged illegal recruitment of staff and the accused’s purported personal gains from unfairly leasing out Waqf Board properties from 2018 to 2022, during Khan’s chairmanship, as stated by the ED.

The money-laundering case originated from an FIR filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and three complaints lodged by the Delhi Police. The agency has stated that numerous “incriminating” materials in both physical and digital formats were seized during the raids, indicating Khan’s participation in the offense of money laundering.