After Senthil Balaji’s exit from Tamil Nadu cabinet, Supreme Court closes plea to recall his bail order

NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday said there was no basis for apprehending that former Tamil Nadu minister V Senthil Balaji would return as a minister or occupy any position of power, underlining that the order to grant him bail in September last year was passed on the ground that he was no longer holding any position of power.

A bench of justices Abhay S Oka and AG Masih closed the application seeking recall of the September 2024 order granting bail to Senthil Balaji, noting that the application has become irrelevant in view of Balaji’s resignation from the state’s council of ministers on Sunday.

Balaji’s exit from the state cabinet came a day before the top court’s deadline to make a choice between post and freedom was to end on Monday, warning that the court would cancel his bail if he did not step down.

During the hearing last week, the court had told Balaji to choose between post and liberty as the court observed, “When you were a minister, categorical findings have been recorded against you in the manner in which you brought about settlement and the proceedings are quashed. Grant of bail does not mean power to influence witnesses. In the past, you have influenced witnesses... So, you have to make a choice between the post and the freedom,” the bench said.

Solicitor general Tushar Mehta, who appeared for the Enforcement Directorate (ED), and senior advocate Gopal Sankaranarayanan, who appeared for a victim in the case, asked the court to explicitly pass an order prohibiting the DMK leader from occupying a position of power till the completion of the trial.

Dealing with this apprehension, the bench recorded in its order. “In the light of the decision of this court in Y Balaji v Kartik (2023) (where the court is monitoring the trial in the offences probed by state against Balaji) and in light of the fact that the bail application made by respondent (Balaji) is entertained only on the ground that he is no longer holding position of power, we do not think there is any basis in that apprehension,” the bench said.

Mehta told the bench that while the court was monitoring trial in the Y Balaji matter, the court may ensure that the trial in the money laundering case probed by ED was also expedited.

Balaji is accused in a cash-for-jobs case involving alleged irregularities in recruitments in the state’s transport department between 2011 and 2015, when he held the portfolio in the then AIADMK-led government.

Mehta recalled that soon after getting bail from the top court on September 26, 2024, Balaji returned as cabinet minister within two days and the trial in the ED case got delayed.

Mehta’s apprehensions were echoed by Sankaranarayanan who pointed out that the application was moved by his client as the accused person’s conduct has never been above board. “A condition can be added that he will not hold any public office till the trial is complete. There are cases where senior ministers are told you cannot enter the state and also where a sitting chief minister has been asked not to touch any official file....He should not end up fooling us a second time.

Senior advocates Kapil Sibal and Mukul Rohatgi appearing for Balaji told the court that it was unfair to argue such conditions as the court was not powerless. Sibal produced a press release issued by the governor’s office accepting Balaji’s resignation. He said that the trial in the predicate offence has 200 accused and the trial will take a long time to conclude.

The bench told Tushar Mehta, “You are taking the risk of going ahead with the ED trial without the trial being completed in the predicate offence. In law can ED trial continue with a predicate offence not being decided”.

The bench also underlined that there was no occasion to modify the bail conditions since the application filed by his client only sought recall of the order.

Mehta said this was a case where Balaji, since his arrest in the ED case in June 2023 continued as a minister as the position in the cabinet was kept vacant for him. In February 2024, just before his bail application was to be considered by the Madras high court, he resigned citing “change of circumstance” and after being granted bail by the top court last year, within two days he was reinstated as a cabinet minister in the DMK-led government and assigned the same key portfolios — electricity, non-conventional energy development, prohibition and excise — he held previously.

“The very purpose of requiring him to step down is that he should not wield influence over witnesses and hamper trial because of his position. We should not become a laughingstock,” Mehta said.

The court told ED that it would always be open for the agency to seek cancellation of bail in the event witnesses are influenced. “That occasion may arise within a month as nobody can live without power,” Mehta said.