MUMBAI, April 14 -- A special Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court in Mumbai on Monday granted bail to Vipul Joshi, his father Gangaram Joshi and his wife Vaishali Joshi in the alleged Rs.107-crore Axis Mutual Fund front-running money-laundering case. The accused had appeared before the court pursuant to summons and were formally taken into judicial custody in view of the non-bailable nature of the offence. The prosecution case centres on allegations that Vipul's brother, former Axis Mutual Fund dealer Viresh Joshi, carried out systematic front-running (an illegal market manipulation based on advance non-public knowledge of a large pending client order). Joshi allegedly did this during the Covid-19 work-from-home period by exploiting confidential, price-sensitive information about impending fund trades. The Enforcement Directorate (ED) claims that he accessed advance knowledge of large buy-and-sell orders of mutual fund schemes and executed trades in the same securities ahead of those transactions, profiting from the price movements once the institutional orders were placed. The trades were allegedly channelled through a network of brokers, shell entities and accounts operated in the names of associates and family members to disguise the funds' origin. The alleged proceeds-estimated at over Rs.100 crore-were later layered to appear legitimate. The predicate offence, registered by the Economic Offences Wing (EOW), includes charges of cheating, breach of trust, forgery and conspiracy. Granting relief, the court noted the accused were never arrested during the probe and that the ED did not invoke its arrest powers under the PMLA. With cognisance already taken, the court held that the purpose of securing their presence could be achieved through bonds rather than custodial detention. The ED opposed bail, citing flight risk and possible impact on trial but the court said the argument did not justify incarceration in the absence of prior arrest, and released them on Rs.1 lakh personal bonds with sureties....