​ED Director Sanjay Mishra’s Long Tenure to End: The Man Who Put 15 Senior Politicians in Jail

Sanjay Mishra’s tenure as the director of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) is set to end on July 31, following the Supreme Court order which held his third extension till November invalid.

However, his five-year tenure saw around 15 senior politicians, including former finance and home minister P Chidambaram, former deputy chief minister of Delhi Manish Sisodia, ex-chief minister of Jammu and Kashmir Farooq Abdullah, Tamil Nadu’s influential minister Senthil Balaji, Bengal’s senior minister Partha Chatterjee, and over a dozen Indian Administrative Services (IAS) officers, go behind bars.

Mishra, an Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer, was in his fifth year as the ED director, the maximum on a post for any bureaucrat, as even the maximum term that any cabinet secretary has had so far is four years. He got a third extension last year.

Believed to be the most “efficient” among the heads of central agencies and the closest to the Prime Minister’s Office, Mishra has “delivered justice” to many politicians, bureaucrats, and fraudulent corporates, according to a senior Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer who worked with him.

Mishra made ED the fiercest central agency among all and that made him the most “loyal and efficient” to the people who matter, the officer added.

181 POLITICAL CASES UNDER PROBE

The ED, under Mishra’s leadership, entered the territory which remained almost uncharted, barring a few exceptions — cases involving senior politicians. Post Lalu Prasad Yadav’s arrest in the fodder scam, India has rarely seen a senior politician of a CM or ex-home minister’s stature getting arrested. In fact, senior bureaucrats were almost insulated from such actions.

Mishra, however, broke that convention. Of the 726 cases that the ED is now probing, 181 are related to political leaders, said a top official of ED.

The official further added that 191 important cases related to massive scams, political or bureaucratic corruption or bank frauds or laundering of money are now in trial.

MASTER OF LAW

The Opposition parties called him “Modi’s man” who “helped him in intimidation and in breaking parties”. For his peers and juniors, Mishra was a “ruthless professional” who knows how to get the job done and is a master of using law and legal power of the directorate.

During Mishra’s stint, Chidambaram, who served as the finance and home minister, was arrested. And the arrests of multiple powerful politicians followed.

THE THREE EXTENSIONS

Mishra was appointed the ED chief in 2018. An order last November said he will continue in his chair till November 18, 2023. The government had last year brought in an ordinance to enable itself to give a five-year term to the ED and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) chiefs, up from two years.

The government argued before the Supreme Court, where the move was challenged, that the tenure of the ED chief had been earlier extended “in public interest” as various cases being probed by the agency were at a crucial juncture and continuity of officers means proper and expeditious disposal of cases.

The ordinances were later passed as bills in Parliament last December where the Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) minister argued that “…if in the middle of an important case if you change the head of the agency, others may not be able to carry it forward in the same tone” to justify the five-year-long tenures.

The government had termed the move in the interest of national security and the stability of the financial structure. The ED director “has a very crucial role in money laundering cases, and is possibly the only agency of its kind available in India”, the government told Parliament

Mishra’s term as the director was extended thrice by the government and his third term was scheduled to end in November.

RECLUSIVE OFFICER

Mishra is known to be a reclusive officer, who refuses to meet any politician or accused, and stresses on speedy investigation and zero tolerance for corruption during its internal meetings.

A senior officer serving in the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said Mishra made ED a “strong” organization with sweeping powers.