On July 21, 2025, the Supreme Court issued its strongest rebuke yet to the Enforcement Directorate (ED), warning it against becoming an instrument for political vendettas. Dismissing the agency’s appeal against a Karnataka high court decision that quashed money-laundering charges against the wife of the chief minister and a state Congress minister, Chief Justice B.R. Gavai bluntly asked, “Why are you being used…?” The court further warned, “Do not percolate this virus across the country,” reminding the ED that political battles must be fought at the ballot box, not through state machinery.On the same day, in another matter, the Supreme Court expressed alarm at the ED’s increasingly brazen tactics, remarking that it had “crossed all limits” by summoning lawyers for simply advising clients. Calling it a “direct threat” to the independence of the legal profession and, by extension, the justice system, the court’s criticism echoed an earlier observation made on June 25, when it denounced the practice of compelling lawyers to appear in investigations.Just two months earlier, in May 2025, the court stayed all ED proceedings against Tamil Nadu’s TASMAC, the state’s liquor marketing body, calling the agency’s actions a violation of the constitutional federal structure. The CJI, clearly exasperated, asked why the ED was treating a public corporation as a criminal entity and insisted that any criminal investigation should focus on individuals, not institutions.Taken together, these comments signal a growing judicial unease with the ED’s overreach and politicisation. However, they cannot be understood in isolation. The situation today is not merely the result of an overzealous agency. It is, more fundamentally, the product of a sustained failure on the part of the Supreme Court itself to impose legal and constitutional limits on the ED’s powers when it had the opportunity and the responsibility to do so.The ED, established to combat money laundering, operates without institutional autonomy. Its functioning is entirely tethered to the executive, making it a ripe tool for political misuse. This problem has been compounded by judicial pronouncements that have, in effect, expanded its powers while simultaneously diluting procedural safeguards for the accused.A pivotal moment came in Vijay Madanlal Chaudhary v. Union of India (July 2022), where a five-judge bench headed by Justice A.M. Khanwilkar upheld controversial 2019 amendments to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). These changes allowed arrests without supplying an Enforcement Case Information Report (ECIR), sanctioned searches and seizures without adhering to the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC), reversed the burden of proof under Section 24, and permitted statements made to the ED – an agency held to be not a police force – to be admissible in court. The twin bail conditions under Section 45 made bail nearly impossible. Legal scholars widely criticised this ruling for eviscerating Articles 14, 21 and 22 of the Constitution. It laid the foundation for an alternate criminal process – one shorn of transparency, fairness and accountability.Although later rulings attempted to moderate some of these excesses, the core framework enabling ED overreach remains intact. Within this framework, politically sensitive cases, particularly against opposition leaders, activists and dissenters, have flourished with the constitutional endorsement of the apex court.Further compounding the issue was the Dr. Jaya Thakur v. Union of India verdict in July 2023. The court here upheld the legality of repeated extensions to the ED Director’s tenure – first through executive orders, then through retrospective legislative amendment. By validating these extensions, the court endorsed a model where the agency’s head effectively serves at the government’s pleasure. As constitutional scholar Gautam Bhatia noted, such extensions create a chilling effect, entrenching executive influence and eroding institutional independence.Even earlier, the Finance Act, 2019, passed as a money bill, amended the PMLA to erode procedural safeguards. It enabled ED officers to initiate coercive action merely on “reason to believe”, eliminating the need for judicial oversight or the presence of a predicate offence. When challenged, the Supreme Court upheld these amendments, reiterating that ED officials were not police officers and thus not subject to CrPC restrictions. This reasoning, while legally formalistic, has led to deeply troubling consequences for civil liberties.In all these instances, the Supreme Court chose to privilege institutional convenience and executive trust over constitutional scrutiny. The result is a legal regime where the ED enjoys powers that even regular law enforcement agencies do not possess –without a proportionate framework of accountability.In oral remarks, the court now voices concern. But these rhetorical flourishes cannot substitute for jurisprudential clarity and constitutional course correction. The review petitions against the Vijay Madanlal verdict – originally listed in mid 2024 – remain pending. Unless the court addresses the foundational legal errors that undergird the ED’s unchecked authority, oral reprimands will do little to deter abuse.The Supreme Court is the guardian of constitutional morality. It must do more than express dismay. It must reckon with the fact that its own decisions, particularly since 2019, have systematically enabled the ED’s current conduct. Upholding expansive state power without procedural accountability has a price. That price has long being paid – by citizens, by the federal structure, and by the credibility of democratic institutions.If the court is truly committed to curbing the ED’s excesses, it must begin not with verbal admonitions, but with a principled and urgent reconsideration of its own rulings. That is the only meaningful antidote to the institutional impunity it has, however inadvertently, helped to foster.Vishal R. Choradiya is an assistant professor at Christ University, Bengaluru.This piece was first published on The India Cable – a premium newsletter from The Wire & Galileo Ideas – and has been updated and republished here. To subscribe to The India Cable, click here.