UPFA MP Namal Rajapaksa, who was arrested on charges of misappropriating Rs.70 million paid to him by the company known as ‘Krrish’ to conduct a rugby tournament held in 2013, was yesterday remanded till July 18 by Fort Magistrate Lanka Jayaratne.
The FCID also charged him under the Money Laundering Act.
The FCID told court that the suspect had connections with the Director Board of the company named ‘Krrish’ and acquired the keenness to provide a sponsorship for the development of the Rugby.
Accordingly the company agreed to provide Rs. 70 million to a rugby tournament which was about to be held in 2013 June.
The amount of money was however deposited into an account belonging to a person called Nimal Perera, Chairman of Ceylon Premier Sports and later the amount of money was obtained by the suspect, said the FCID.
Former president's Mahinda Rajapaksa's eldest son, Namal was summoned by the FCID last morning to record a statement on this matter of financial misappropriation.
Meanwhile former, Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa also gave a statement to the Financial Crimes Investigations Division (FCID) this morning in connection with another incident of financial misappropriation.
According to Defence lawyers, the tournament was organized by the Ceylon Premier Sports (CPS) and Ceylon Super Sports (CSS). CPS was dealing with all the ten teams while the CSS was handling the event, said the Counsel.
The FCID alleged that according to investigation conducted so far the suspect had not proven how he had spent the money given by the Krrish Company in to the rugby tournament organized in 2013.
The FCID suspected that the suspect had deposited the Rs. 50 million in a Bangladesh national, Al Saman’s account. Later the suspect had withdrawn it from the foreigner and obtained another Rs. 50 million from a bank as a loan to purchase the company named Hellocorp committing a crime that fell under the Money Laundering Act.
Appearing for the suspect, Counsel Sampath Mendis and Jayantha Weerasinghe PC told court that the complaint over the incident was lodged by a politician, Wasantha Samarasinghe and not by the Krrish Company.
Accepting that the money was obtained for the purpose of organizing a rugby tournament, they said that the money was spent for the event through CSS over various expenses.
The counsel said that the suspect could have proven his innocence over the allegations if the FCID had not raided his office and obtained certain documents relating to the expenses of the rugby event recently.
They also requested the magistrate to grant bail to the the suspect who had not intervened with witnesses or affected the investigations.
The counsel rejected the allegation of Money Laundering and said there was another inquiry at the Colombo Chief Magistrate’s Court relating to the same Money Laundering allegation but no sufficient evidence had been put forward yet to name his client a suspect in the inquiry.
Rejecting the bail application, the Magistrate considered that the suspect had failed to prove how he spent the money in the tournament properly because it was on the trust that the Company ‘Krrish’ had given the money.
Acceding the FCID to record statements from some foreigners over the inquiry, the Magistrate remanded the suspect allowing the prosecution to conduct the investigation broadly.
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