The Madras High Court on Tuesday (August 4, 2026) dismissed a plea by the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) to transfer a disproportionate assets case against former DMK Minister Anitha R. Radhakrishnan and his family members from a Principal District and Sessions Court in Thoothukudi to a court of equal rank in Madurai.

First Division Bench of Chief Justice Sushrut Arvind Dharmadhikari and Justice G. Arul Murugan held that the question of transferring the case for a joint trial would not arise at all when the principal sessions court in Madurai was yet to take cognisance of a connected money laundering complaint lodged by the ED.

The judges held that Section 44(1)(c) of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), 2002, provides for joint trial of the predicate offence along with the subsequent money laundering charge only if the courts dealing with both the offences had taken cognisance of the cases and not otherwise.

In the present case, the Thoothukudi sessions court was on the verge of winding up the trial in the disproproportionate assets case booked by the Directorate of Vigilance and Anti Corruption (DVAC) for having amassed unexplained assets worth ₹2.68 crore during Mr. Radhakrishnan’s stint as a Minister in the AIADMK Cabinet between 2001 and 2006.

The DVAC had examined 79 witnesses and marked 312 exhibits, while the defence had examined six witnesses and marked 74 exhibits. The prosecution had completed its oral as well as written arguments and the defence had argued the matter in part.

On the other hand, the Madurai sessions court, designated as a PMLA special court before which the ED had lodged the money laundering complaint in 2025 on the basis of the disproportionate assets case, was yet to take cognisance of the matter. In fact, the ED had not even obtained the mandatory sanction to prosecute the former Minister even after a year since the PMLA complaint was filed, the judges highlighted.

“Section 44(1)(c) of the PMLA exists to save time and to avoid the risk of two courts reaching different conclusions on the same facts. It was never meant to serve as a means of reopening a trial that has, for all practical purposes, already been fought and finished,” the judges wrote.

They said transferring the disproportionate assets case from Thoothukudi to Madurai at the present stage would only delay the trial which was already on the verge of conclusion. “A trial delayed at its very end, for reasons having nothing to do with its own merits, is a trial denied in substance,” the Chief Justice wrote.

After dismissing the ED’s transfer plea, the judges vacated the interim stay granted by them in April 2026 against the trial pending before the Thoothukudi sessions court and directed the latter to proceed with all due expedition.

Published - August 04, 2026 06:53 pm IST