Bollywood actress Jacqueline Fernandez has approached the Supreme Court (SC) challenging the Delhi High Court’s rejection of her plea to quash proceedings in the ?200 crore money laundering case linked to alleged conman Sukesh Chandrasekhar. She has also sought an interim stay of trial against her. 

She had asked the High Court to quash the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR) and the second supplementary complaint that named her as the 10th accused in the case. In her plea, the actress argued that the evidence filed by the ED would show she is an “innocent victim” of Sukesh’s “maliciously targeted attack", the news report said.

The plea highlighted that the ED itself admitted that Tihar jail officials gave Sukesh unrestricted access to mobile phones and other technology, which he allegedly used to con the original complainant and several film personalities, including Fernandez, following the same method. The plea added that since Fernandez was presented as a prosecution witness in the predicate offence, any subsequent proceedings against her should logically be quashed.

On July 3, Justice Anish Dayal dismissed Fernandez’s plea. The court observed that her concern about potential self-incrimination cannot be a reason to quash the ECIR, as statutory and constitutional protections already exist to address such issues.

“This alone cannot assist the petitioner and release her from the yoke of prosecution under ECIR,” the court said.

 The court further noted that the points raised by Fernandez were subjective and required a trial to be properly examined. It explained, “Attribution of knowledge for the purposes of PMLA implication may potentially bring in its fold the full range, spectrum and degrees of ‘knowing’. For example, whether turning a blind eye to an obvious fact or disturbing news or a critical disclosure of illegality, would amount to ‘knowing’ or not is a matter that, in this court's opinion, can be determined post-trial, when the court has all strands of evidence for appreciation.”

Following the High Court ruling, Fernandez has now moved the SC.

 She contends that she is a prosecution witness in the predicate offence and that Sukesh and his aide Pinky Irani tried to mislead her into believing that Sukesh Chandrasekhar was a successful businessman often targetted politically.

Her plea states, “The petitioner cannot be summoned to suffer trial for an offence u/S.3 of PMLA in the absence of any admissible evidence to indicate her positive knowledge that the gifts given to her were derived from any criminal activity.”

The actress argues that the prosecution material itself shows she lacked mens rea, as no evidence suggests she had knowledge of the offence.