Today (September 04, 2024), Senior Advocate Kapil Sibal mentioned before the Supreme Court (SC) of India the review petitions pending against the Vijay Madanlal Choudhary judgment that upheld various provisions of the PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act). The SC bench of Justice Surya Kant and Justice Ujjal Bhuyan tentatively listed the review petitions on September 18, 2024. Justice CT Ravikumar, Justice Kant, and Justice Bhuyan are hearing the review petitions in the matter. As Justice Ravikumar was not sitting today; therefore, the matter had to be re-listed. Earlier on July 22, the SC said that it would hear the review petitions in August. Further, on this date, the matter had to be adjourned at the request of Solicitor General Tushar Mehta because he needed some more time to prepare and argue. To recap, on July 27, 2022, the SC bench delivered the Vijay Madanlal Choudhary judgment that upheld certain provisions of the PMLA including,
- Sections 5, 8(4), 15, 17, and 19 of PMLA, relating to the Enforcement Directorate's (ED’s) power of arrest, attachment, search and seizure;
- Section 24 of PMLA, relating to reverse burden of proof;
- Section 45 of PMLA, provides "twin conditions" for bail (in this regard, it was said that the Parliament was competent to amend the provision in 2018 even after the SC's judgment in Nikesh Tarachand Shah, which struck down the conditions).
After the judgment, 8 review petitions were filed. The SC bench will hear these review petitions on September 18, 2024.