The Centre on Friday filed action taken report in the Supreme Court in a sealed cover on the steps taken to get back the “black money” stashed by Indians in secret bank accounts in Liechtenstein, a small landlocked nation between Austria and Switzerland.
However, the government law officer had strong objection to sharing the details with senior advocate Ram Jethmalani, who had field a PIL on behalf of several prominent citizens seeking a direction to the government to take effective steps to bring back the unaccounted money after Germany, which has some control on Liechtenstein, to help in return of the same to India.
Additional solicitor-general Parag Tripathi, who also submitted some 16 documents related to correspondence between Indian and German authorities on the issue, also refused to share the letters written by either country with Mr Jethmalani, who was on Friday represented by another senior lawyer Anil Diwan.
On the letters about the alleged secret accounts of Indian businessman Hassan Ali Khan, the government counsel said even the German authorities had raised doubts about its “authenticity”. The letter allegedly received from German authorities had furnished details about $1.5 billion of Mr Khan’s secret accounts. But Mr Tripathi said “there is serious dispute” over the authenticity of the letter while Mr Khan had claimed that it was “forged”.
Mr Diwan raised questions why the government had tried to bring in the provisions of DTAA between Indian and Germany on the issue when German authorities had expressed full cooperation in the matter.
After Germany had offered help in unearthing black money stashed in Liechtenstein, the PIL was filed by Mr Jethmalani.