Is the state targeting Jignesh Shah?

The manner in which Jignesh Shah, the Founder of the financial infrastructure giant, 63 moons technologies ltd (formerly Financial Technologies India Limited), is being hounded, it only appears as if all the investigating agencies & regulators are hell bent on clutching him in every which way.

 Like seen in most Bollywood films, the episodes of Jignesh Shah’s arrests and subsequent releases, duplicate a probable villain-victim drama. When the CBI arrested Shah on September 20, 2016, for a two year old case and that too with regards to the licensing of his earlier venture MCX-SX that dated back to 2010, it was clear that there was a high-handed state action in targeting only one person time and again. While the CBI had registered an FIR in this regard in August 2014, what made it suddenly arrest Shah for a six year old matter is still not explained.

This was Shah’s third arrest in three years, ever since a setback to one of his subsidiaries in 2013, captivated almost all government agencies to go about their own ways in nabbing him.

While the CBI cited “non-cooperation” as a reason to arrest him, the nation’s premier and trusted investigating agency did not manage to find any criminality against Shah for allegedly influencing SEBI for renewal of the MCX-SX license, despite keeping him in custody for about a month. Moreover, Shah was the only person held by the CBI in this case, while none of the accused public servants or others were arrested. The CBI had already given a clean chit to the key decision makers in the preliminary inquiry, forcing the entire brigade against Shah.

Earlier in July this year, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) took Shah in custody for his alleged role in assisting defaulters in laundering of funds raised from thousands of investors on his subsidiary National Spot Exchange Ltd (NSEL) that resulted in a payment default of Rs 5,600 crore. The ED claimed that it had a fresh case against him. The ED had registered the case way back in May 2015 against Shah and 68 others but it arrested only Shah for reasons best known to it! What was more surprising was the fact that charges presented by the ED were already there in the first charge sheet filed in the court. Do you arrest again to file a supplementary charge sheet?

In May 2014, the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) – Mumbai, had taken Shah into custody on a charge of ‘non-cooperation’ and put him in jail for 108 days until the Hon’ble Bombay High Court released him on bail in August that year ruling that “no money had come to NSEL, FTIL or its promoters...The money has gone to the borrowers or bogus sellers…”

It takes a life to build a successful exchange, but Jignesh Shah contributed to multiple exchange institutes within 10 years across Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. The man, who put Indian markets on the World map, is now being restrained by a few competitors and some vested interests that feared his disruption and ideas and could not cope up with his creativity.

Targeting Jignesh Shah, who created ventures that generated millions of jobs and revenue to the economy, on charges like “non-cooperation”, is an irony in itself. It seems as an attempt to victimize him and move focus from his ahead-of-time creations. The nation’s top advocates, like Majeed Memon and KTS Tulsi, too have expressed their anguish over the investigative agencies’ approach of handling the matters.

We hope and pray that the agencies are just and fair in their dealings.

Reference -ShantanuGuhaRay:(2016): ‘The Target Book’: New Delhi: Publisher: AuthorsUpfront