In ‘Lottery King’ Case, Supreme Court Restrains Probe Agency From Copying Laptop, Mobile Data

New Delhi:

The Supreme Court has passed interim orders restraining the Enforcement Directorate from accessing and copying content from electronic devices seized during searches on ‘lottery king’ Santiago Martin, whose company donated the most to political parties through electoral bonds.

The Supreme Court has clubbed four cases involving NewsClick, Amazon India and others seeking guidelines on the seizure of electronic devices. The petitioners are seeking protection of their Fundamental Rights, particularly the ‘Right To Privacy’. The Supreme Court has issued notices returnable on February 17.

Money Laundering Probe Against Lottery King

Martin was the single-biggest donor to political parties, purchasing over Rs 1,300 crore worth of now-scrapped electoral bonds, through his firm Future Gaming. 

In November, the probe agency carried out searches in several states as part of the money laundering probe against the ‘lottery king’. At least 20 premises linked to Martin, his son-in-law Aadhav Arjun and associates in Chennai and Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu, Faridabad in Haryana, Ludhiana in Punjab and Kolkata in West Bengal were searched as part of a “comprehensive” action against his business empire.

The probe agency seized at least Rs 8.8 crore cash during the searches. It came after the Madras High Court allowed the probe agency to proceed against Martin when the Tamil Nadu Police had closed the primary case against him and a few others and the trial court had accepted the cops’ request.

In 2014, the CBI registered the case in the alleged lottery scam and filed a chargesheet against Martin and others. Based on the chargesheet, the Enforcement Directorate filed a complaint against seven people including Martin for money laundering in June 2018.

In April 2024, the Supreme Court stayed the proceedings before the special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court. A bench of Justices Abhay S Oka and Ujjal Bhuyan issued notice on Martin’s plea, where he challenged the order of the PMLA court in Kerala which dismissed his petition for keeping in abeyance the trial in the money laundering case registered by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Future Gaming – The Biggest Donor

Santiago Martin’s Future Gaming and Hotel Services was the top purchaser of electoral bonds, which donated  Rs 509 crore to Tamil Nadu’s ruling party Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam. 

Future Gaming purchased electoral bonds worth Rs 1,368 crore, of which nearly 37 per cent went to the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam or DMK. Megha Engineering (Rs 105 crore), India Cements (Rs 14 crore) and Sun TV (Rs 10 crore) were other major donors of the DMK which was among the few political parties to disclose the identity of the donors.

In February, the Supreme Court struck down electoral bonds, which provided blanket anonymity to individuals and corporate entities making donations to political parties, as “unconstitutional and manifestly arbitrary”.