After a trial court on January 24 granted interim bail to Manoj Gaur, the former Chairman & Managing Director of Jaypee Infratech Ltd who accused in a money laundering case worth over Rs 13,000 crore, the Delhi High Court on January 30 directed the Enforcement Directorate (ED), the prosecuting agency, to verify the grounds on which the interim bail was granted after the agency had challenged the trial court’s order.
In the order, made public on Tuesday, Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani directed ED to “verify the current medical condition” of Gaur’s mother and file a status report before February 6 when the HC will hear the matter next.
The trial court had granted Gaur interim bail on the grounds of his mother being on the “deathbed”. According to the ED, the bail was granted solely on the basis of two photographs of Gaur’s mother where she was seen “receiving feed through a nasal tube”.
The HC has also issued a notice to Gaur after the ED challenged the trial court’s order.
Gaur was arrested by the ED on November 13 last year in connection with a money laundering case involving the alleged diversion of over Rs 13,800 crore of homebuyers’ money. Around 25,000 homebuyers were allegedly promised flats in Noida and Greater Noida, but those were never delivered to them.
As per the ED, Rs 32,825 crore was collected from the homebuyers and Rs 13,833 crore were siphoned off. The agency has so far attached assets worth Rs 147 crore in the case. It has also claimed that Gaur’s role was central in the planning and execution of the diversion of funds “through a complex web of transactions within the Jaypee Group and its associated entities”.
According to the ED, the trial court relied on the past medical records of Gaur’s mother, as recorded by the agency at the time of his arrest three months ago.
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“The court can understand her medical condition as depicted in the photograph and apparently, she is in bad shape,” Additional Sessions Judge Dhirendra Rana of Patiala House Court reasoned in his order on January 24.
However, the ED, in its plea, pointed out that “no opportunity was given” to the prosecution to verify the present medical condition of Gaur’s mother. It moved the HC on January 29, challenging the trial court’s order, and submitted that they had never filed any reply before the trial court on Gaur’s plea for interim bail.
The ED argued that the trial court “committed error in forming his own opinion about the medical condition of the mother by assuming the role of a medical expert”.
The agency also objected to one of the conditions imposed by the trial court while granting the interim bail. The trial court had stated that “in case of any future criminal involvement, the interim bail shall not be extended”.
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ED, represented by its standing counsel Rahul Tyagi, pointed out that such a condition “appears to imply that if there’s no future criminal involvement, the interim bail would likely be extended”.
Acceding to ED’s argument, Justice Bhambhani, on January 30, directed that this condition “would not read to imply that (Gaur) is entitled to extension of interim bail merely for the asking if he has no future criminal involvement.”
Tyagi, assisted by advocates Jatin and Aniket Kumar Singh, also argued before the court: “A perception has been growing in India that prompt justice is preserved only for the rich. And orders like these give credence to such perceptions…One does not need to go to see the records to find evidence for the loot of the homebuyer’s hard earned money…visit Jaypee’s Wishtown in Noida and you will see the unfinished projects standing as monuments to the homebuyer’s misery.”
Nirbhay Thakur is a Senior Correspondent with The Indian Express who primarily covers district courts in Delhi and has reported on the trials of many high-profile cases since 2023.
Professional Background
Education: Nirbhay is an economics graduate from Delhi University.
Beats: His reporting spans the trial courts, and he occasionally interviews ambassadors and has a keen interest in doing data stories.
Specializations: He has a specific interest in data stories related to courts.
Core Strength: Nirbhay is known for tracking long-running legal sagas and providing meticulous updates on high-profile criminal trials.
Recent notable articles
In 2025, he has written long form articles and two investigations. Along with breaking many court stories, he has also done various exclusive stories.
1) A long form on Surender Koli, accused in the Nithari serial killings of 2006. He was acquitted after spending 2 decades in jail. was a branded man. Deemed the “cannibal" who allegedly lured children to his employer’s house in Noida, murdered them, and “ate their flesh” – his actions cited were cited as evidence of human depravity at its worst. However, the SC acquitted him finding various lapses in the investigation. The Indian Express spoke to his lawyers and traced the 2 decades journey.
2) For decades, the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has been at the forefront of the Government’s national rankings, placed at No. 2 over the past two years alone. It has also been the crucible of campus activism, its protests often spilling into national debates, its student leaders going on to become the faces and voices of political parties of all hues and thoughts. The Indian Express looked at all court cases spanning over two decades and did an investigation.
3) Investigation on the 700 Delhi riots cases. The Indian Express found that in 17 of 93 acquittals (which amounted to 85% of the decided cases) in Delhi riots cases, courts red-flag ‘fabricated’ evidence and pulled up the police.
Signature Style
Nirbhay’s writing is characterized by its procedural depth. He excels at summarizing 400-page chargesheets and complex court orders into digestible news for the general public.
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