HYDERABAD: The Supreme Court has ordered authorities to unseal offices of scam-hit Heera Gold Exim Private Limited, which will facilitate the company to run its businesses.
The apex court also extended the interim bail of main accused Nowhera Sheik till April 19.
Sheik was given interim bail from a Mumbai jail on January 22 on the condition that she return the deposits of complainants. She has been accused of collecting Rs 5,600 crore deposits by the investigating agencies.
The SC on Friday said: “In our view, no purpose would be served now by keeping the office indefinitely sealed and the office should accordingly be de-sealed to facilitate the petitioner to take steps as may be required as we have observed that if it is possible to run the business and facilitate the investors being satisfied, that is a course of action which would be appropriate.”Heera Gold counsel said Nowhera issued cheques to investors in Kerala, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh and complied with bail conditions. On January 19, the apex court, while granting interim bail, had said Nowhera should meet all complainants’ liabilities in cases where the charge sheet has been filed or complaints have been made.
The SC then said money in the frozen accounts was to be used and asked investigating agencies to cooperate. The case came up in court on Friday.
Heera Gold had issued 10 cheques to investors in Maharasthra, but these were drawn on an account of HDFC Bank in Kerala, which the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had frozen. “The Enforcement Directorate must make sure the account is de-freezed for making the payments and any further payments,” the court said.
Regarding Telangana, the SC said, “We fail to appreciate why the documents which were sought by the petitioner from the investigating officer to verify the claim of 347 investors have not been handed over. If the original documents have been filed with the charge sheet and some documents have been sent to the forensic science laboratory, still copies of the documents would be available.”
Counsel for Telangana informed the SC that the copies of the documents, including copies of the hard disk, would be handed over within two weeks to the petitioner to facilitate her verification of the claims.