^{Saradha chit case: Madras HC asks ED not to take any precipitative action against Nalini Chidambaram}

CHENNAI: The Madras high court on Tuesday asked the Enforcement Directorate (ED) not to take any precipitative action against senior advocate Nalini Chidambaram, wife of Congress strongman P Chidambaram, in the Saradha chit scam case.
An interim direction to this effect was given by Justice T S Sivagnanam to additional solicitor general of India G Rajagopalan when the judge reserved his orders on Nalini's writ petition to quash the summons.
Assailing the summons, issued over her receipt of over Rs 1 crore as fee from promoters of Saradha Group, Nalini said the summons was illegal, since as per Section 160 of Code of Civil Procedure, a woman could not be summoned by police. Instead, police should hold an inquiry only at her residence.
She urged the court declare the summons as illegal and to restrain ED officials from taking any action pursuant to the summons.
Nalini fully cooperated with the ED, which had sent her three summonses earlier. She had furnished all documents and replies to ED queries, and her authorised representative too explained them in person. She is now before the court against the fourth summons slapped on her.
During arguments, her senior advocate R Krishnamoorthy said she had replied to a questionnaire promptly, filled up all responses and her representative offered explanation personally. If the ED was not satisfied with those responses, it should have mentioned that in the latest summons, he said.
Another senior counsel, Vijay Narayan, said: "It is not protection. It is persecution."
Additional solicitor general Rajagopalan, however, said it was a mere summons based on which one could not assume whether one had been involved in a case or not. ED might have summoned her for a different purpose, he said.
At the end of the arguments, Justice Sivagnanam reserved the orders but told additional solicitor general that ED should not take any precipitative action against Nalini in the meanwhile.
Lawyers part of Nalini's team told TOI that over Rs 1 crore was paid to her for more than 25 appearances in courts and company law board, and that the money was paid by Saradha Group chairman Sudhipto Sen because it was a clause in an agreement between Sudhipto and former Union minister Matang Singh's wife Manoranjana over a television channel purchase deal. Only the latter was Nalini's client, counsel said.
Her fee was paid in cheque, and she declared it in her tax returns and paid tax as well, they said. Also, the transactions had taken place well before the Saradha scam case, they said.
Pointing out that the CBI had already filed chargesheet in the Saradha chit fund scam case before a court in West Bengal, Nalini said her name didn’t figure in it either as a witness or an accused. Despite that the ED had been issuing summonses to her, she said.