Karti Chidambaram, son of former Union finance minister P Chidambaram has approached the Madras High Court seeking to quash the look out circular (LOC) issued against him at the Bureau of Immigration in the Union Ministry of Home Affairs to prevent him from travelling abroad. He alleged it was arbitrary and without jurisdiction by the foreigner regional registration officer (FRRO).
Justice M Duraiswamy adjourned the plea to August 7 for further hearing after the additional solicitor general G Rajagopalan sought time to get instructions whether such a circular has been issued.
According to the petitioner, the LOC dated July 18 has been issued under Section 10B of the Passport Act.
The matter pertains to a FIR filed by the CBI on May 15 against Karti and INX Media along with eight others for the alleged irregularities in the Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) clearance given to the media house for FDI in 2007 when his father was the finance minister.
"The circular is a well thought out and meticulously orchestrated fraudulent plan of the CBI to stop me at the airport as and when I want to fly abroad by springing an unpleasant surprise on me, and leak it to the media that I was detained at the airport and cause embarrassment to me," he alleged.
Karti was summoned twice by the CBI since June this year to appear before it for questioning in connection with alleged irregularities in the clearance given by the FIPB to the media group. He had sought time to appear before the probe agency which had registered an FIR alleging that a firm indirectly controlled by him had received money from the INX media, run by Indrani and Peter Mukerjea.
Claiming that the CBI issued the summons when he was abroad on personal work, Karti said his counsel had duly informed the CBI about this in a letter dated June 20. He said the LOC was a coercive measure to make a person surrender to the investigating agency only if it was amply demonstrated that he repeatedly and deliberately failed to cooperate with the investigation. Hence, he wanted the court to quash the order.
