On Wednesday (8th November), the Enforcement Directorate (ED) questioned senior Congress leader Pawan Bansal in the National Herald case. He arrived at the agency Headquarters in Delhi around noon for interrogation in the money laundering case.
According to the reports, Bansal had also visited the ED office on 7th November.
However, Bansal, 75, was last interrogated by the agency in April 2022 in connection with a money laundering case involving alleged financial misconduct in the Congress-backed Young Indian, which owned the National Herald newspaper.
The former Union minister was interrogated as the managing director of Associated Journals Limited (AJL) and the Congress’ interim treasurer. The National Herald is owned by Young Indian Pvt Ltd and published by Associated Journals Limited (AJL).
The agency in the year 2022 filed a fresh case under the criminal provisions of the PMLA after a trial court took cognizance of an Income Tax Department probe against Young Indian Pvt Ltd based on a private criminal complaint filed by former BJP MP Subramanian Swamy in 2013.
The National Herald Scam and its history so far
National Herald was started by India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru in 1938 to convey the concerns of Congress’ liberal brigade. Following India’s independence, it metamorphosed into the mouthpiece of the Congress party.
The Associated Journals Limited (AJL) was the publishing company of the National Herald newspaper. It was also involved in the publication of the Urdu newspaper Qaumi Awaz and the Hindi paper Navjivan. By April 2008, AJL was in huge debt and owed the Congress party a whopping sum of Rs 90.26 crores.
The party had sanctioned loans to the company from time to time at 0% interest to keep it afloat. When it became unsustainable, AJL formally drew curtains over the printing and publication of its newspapers in 2008.
Debt owed to Congress party transferred to Gandhi-owned company
Another company by the name of Young Indian Limited (YIL) was created in 2010 as a private, not-for-profit charity under Section 25 of the Companies Act of 1956. The Gandhis (including Rahul and Sonia) owned 83.3% of the shares in YIL (as per Income Tax records).
Congress leaders Motilal Vora and Oscar Fernandes owned 15.5% and 1.2% of the shares respectively. YIL paid Rs 50 lakhs to the Congress party and transferred the debt of Rs 90.26 cr owed to it by AJL to itself.
Given that AJL was not in a position to clear its debt, Young Indian Pvt Limited acquired a majority of its share equities and eventually the whole company. As such, all assets of the Associated Journals Limited were incorporated into the Gandhi-owned Young Indian Limited.
This included real estate assets, worth over 2000 crores, which are located in posh localities of Mumbai, New Delhi, Lucknow, Bhopal, Indore, Patna, and others. After acquiring AJL, Young Indian Limited announced that the publication of newspapers was not the objective of the not-for-profit charity.
Nonetheless, in 2016, YIL relaunched the 3 newspapers, including the National Herald, in a digital format.
In 2011, Swamy claimed that YIL was floated by the Gandhis to acquire the real-estate assets of AJL. He also accused Rahul Gandhi and Sonia Gandhi of defrauding their party and approached the trial court in 2013.
He claimed that YIL was able to write off debt totaling Rs 90.26 crores for just Rs 50 lakhs. Swamy said that the decision of the Congress party to extend loans to AJL for commercial purposes was illegal.
Notably, the agency in the year 2022 filed a fresh case under the criminal provisions of the PMLA after a trial court took cognizance of an Income Tax Department probe against Young Indian Pvt Ltd based on a private criminal complaint filed by former BJP MP Subramanian Swamy in 2013.