New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday (August 7) slammed the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and told it that it must function strictly within the bounds of the law. It also highlighted the poor conviction rate in cases registered by the agency.“You can’t act like a crook,” a Supreme Court bench comprising Justices Surya Kant, Ujjal Bhuyan, and N. Kotiswar Singh told the ED on Thursday, reported Times of India.The apex court made the observation while hearing petitions seeking a review of the its July 2022 ruling which upheld ED’s powers of arrest, search, and seizure under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).Additional solicitor general (ASG) S.V. Raju, who appeared for the Union government and the ED, argued that the review petitions were not maintainable. He described the review petitions as mere “disguised appeals” against the earlier verdict and claimed that “influential crooks” exploit the legal process to delay investigations by filing multiple applications, forcing ED officers to focus on court appearances instead of conducting probes.However, Justice Bhuyan raised concerns about the agency’s low conviction rate.“You can’t act like a crook, you have to act within the four corners of the law. I observed in one of my judgments that ED has registered around 5,000 ECIRs (enforcement case information report) in the past five years but the conviction rate is less than 10 per cent. We are also concerned about ED’s image. After 5–6 years of custody, if people are acquitted, who takes responsibility?” said Justice Bhuyan.ASG Raju further said that the agency is often “handicapped” when “influential accused” flee to jurisdictions such as the Cayman Islands.Raju pointed out that in 2019, a Supreme Court Constitution bench had already upheld the PMLA’s constitutional validity.The hearing of review petitions will be continuing next week.In May this year, the Supreme Court had said that the ED was “crossing all limits.”“The ED is crossing all limits…you are totally violating the federal structure of the country,” the top court had said.These utterances were made by a Supreme Court bench led by Chief Justice of India B.R. Gavai as he had rapped the ED in the TASMAC (Tamil Nadu State Marketing Corporation) ‘liquor scam’ case.The words were used by the country’s apex court to question the premier central investigating agency’s actions in an Opposition-ruled state.