NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Wednesday said that the ED cannot arrest accused persons just because they did not cooperate with the ED summons and did not respond to its questions. The ED should not expect the person present for interrogation to confess. The purpose of custodial interrogation is not to force the accused to confess, the court said.

The ED can record the arrest only if the investigating officer has sufficient reason to believe that the accused has committed an offense under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. The Supreme Court stated this while granting bail to two directors of the real estate group M3M in the money laundering case.

The court also rejected the ED's contention that the accused had evaded the questions. The bench comprising Justices AS Bopanna and Sanjay Kumar made these observations in the judgment that the ED should give the reasons for the arrest in writing to the accused while recording the arrest.