The Supreme Court on Monday indicated that it may at a “relevant time” order the setting up of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to exclusively look into revelations made in the Panama papers on nearly 500 high-profile Indians who have allegedly parked money in off-shore accounts.
A Bench of Justices Dipak Misra and R. Banumathi said “everything” cannot be under the control of the SIT set up to investigate black money. That SIT is headed by former Supreme Court judge, Justice M.B. Shah.
“One SIT should not control everything. We are thinking of another SIT. We want an independent SIT,” Justice Misra observed.
The government, represented by Additional Solicitor General P.S. Narasimha, told the Supreme Court that it was “absolutely serious” about investigating disclosures in the Panama papers.
Meanwhile, SEBI has sought time to file its counter in the writ petition filed by Supreme Court advocate M.L. Sharma, who alleged that the leaked documents reveal the commission of a serious fraud.
In an earlier hearing, Additional Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had submitted that a Multi Agency Group (MAG) of various investigative agencies was formed by the government to go into the disclosures made in the list which included about 500 Indian entities.
The Panama leaks contain an unprecedented amount of information, including more than 11 million documents covering 2,10,000 companies in 21 offshore jurisdictions.
