SC to hear Karti's plea against ED's summons on March 6

The Supreme Court on Monday agreed to hear a fresh plea by Karti Chidambaram on March 6 for quashing of the Enforcement Directorate's (ED) summons against him in the INX Media corruption case.

A three-judge bench of Chief Justice Dipak Misra and Justices A M Khanwilkar and D Y Chandrachud put the writ petition for consideration on Tuesday, on a plea for urgent hearing made by advocate Vikas Mehta on behalf of Karti.

"Let the matter be listed tomorrow, the 06th March 2018 before appropriate bench as per roster, subject to removal of defects, if any, along with the connected matter, if any," the bench ordered.

In his fresh writ petition, Karti challenged the summons on the ground that the ED has no jurisdiction to issue such notices based on the FIR lodged by the CBI.

The top court had on February 23 refused to stay the summons issued by the ED against Karti -who is presently in CBI custody in the INX Media money laundering case- after the CBI said he was "not a common criminal" and his plea for quashing the notice was "a guise for an anticipatory bail plea".

However, the top court had asked Karti to request the competent authority to postpone the ED summons seeking his appearance.

The ED had registered a case against him and others in May last year.

It registered an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR), the ED's equivalent of a police FIR, against the accused named in a CBI complaint.

These included Karti Chidambaram, INX Media and its directors, Peter and Indrani Mukerjea.

An FIR, filed on May 15 last year, had claimed irregularities in the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) clearance to INX Media for receiving Rs 305 crore in overseas funds in 2007 when P Chidambaram was the Union finance minister.