Bengaluru: The Enforcement Directorate has moved the Supreme Court seeking to cancel the bail granted to Bineesh Kodiyeri, son of Kerala CPM state secretary Kodiyeri Balakrishnan, in a drug-related money laundering case here.
The Karnataka High Court had granted bail to Bineesh last October after he spent nearly a year in a Bengaluru jail.
The deputy director of ED in Bengaluru has moved the apex court challenging the high court order. The investigation agency states that it has collected strong evidence against Bineesh, the fourth accused in the money laundering case.
Bineesh was arrested on October 29, 2020 by the ED for transferring funds to the tune of over Rs 50 lakh to an alleged drug racket operator who had been nabbed by the Narcotics Control Bureau (NCB) a few months earlier.
The arrests of Kochi resident Anoop Muhammed, Rijesh Raveendran of Thiruvilwamala, Thrissur, and D Anigha, a Kannada TV serial actress, in August 2020 by the NCB had led the investigators to Bineesh, who was named by Anoop during interrogation. The ED registered a case based on suspected tax evasion.
Bineesh stated before the probe agency that he knew Anoop and had lent him money to open a restaurant in Bengaluru. He denied having any other role or links with Anoop's deals. However, the ED arrested Bineesh after pointing out his financial transactions. Witnesses, meanwhile, deposed that Bineesh had attended rave parties along with Anoop.
During further investigation, Anoop's debit card was confiscated during a raid on Bineesh's residence in Thiruvananthapuram. The card bore the signature of Bineesh, officials claimed.
The ED has been arguing that Anoop was Bineesh's benami, and B Capital Financial Services and B Capital Forex Trading Pvt Ltd were firms that remained on paper. Bineesh was the director of these firms.
Bineesh, meanwhile, has been arguing that the deposits in his account were revenues from business and cinema. He was sent to the Central Prison at Parappana Agrahara in the Karnataka capital on November 14 after 14 days of ED questioning.