The Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected a plea by Congress MP and corruption accused Karti Chidambaram to refund the Rs 10 crore he had deposited with the court registry, following a January 30 order, as a precondition for travelling abroad.

“Okay, then we will refund Rs 10 crore but we will modify our second order and will direct you to deposit Rs 20 crore. Is it okay? Shall we pass orders? Just pay attention to your constituency,” Justice Gogoi told Karti’s counsel Shally Bhasin.

Bhasin had argued that since Karti had completed the foreign tours for which he had deposited the money, it should be refunded.

Karti claims to have raised the Rs 10 crore as a loan from a bank, and has argued the sum should be refunded to him so that he can repay the loan instead of having to continue to pay interest on it.

After getting Karti to deposit Rs 10 crore before travelling to Britain, France and Spain in February-March, the apex court on May 7 got him to deposit another Rs 10 crore for planned trips to the US, Britain, France, Germany and Spain in May-June.

When the court on Wednesday warned it might “modify our second order and will direct you to deposit Rs 20 crore”, it was suggesting it would raise the May 7 amount to Rs 20 crore if it were to refund the earlier deposit.

Karti, who won the Sivaganga Lok Sabha seat in the recent general election, is being probed separately by the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate in connection with alleged corruption in the Aircel-Maxis deal and foreign investment in INX Media.

His father and former finance minister P. Chidambaram too is being investigated in these cases.

The Enforcement Directorate had opposed Karti’s travel plans saying he might never return to the country.