The Supreme Court on Friday agreed to hear a plea of the Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal against his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in connection with the Delhi Excise Policy case linked to a money laundering case.
A special bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna, MM Sundresh and Bela Trivedi will hear the matter today.
Senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi mentioned Kejriwal’s plea before a bench headed by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud for an urgent hearing.
“If this process goes on, before the first vote is cast, a lot of senior leaders will be behind the bars. Please take it up,” Singhvi told the bench.
CJI then asked him to mention his plea before a special three-judge bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna, which was hearing the plea of BRS leader K Kavitha against her arrest by the ED in the liquor policy case, at that time.
However, by the time Singhvi reached Court number 2 of Justice Khanna, the special bench sitting had concluded and the regular two-judges bench of Justices Khanna and Dipankar Datta assembled.
Singhvi then mentioned the matter before Justice Khanna, saying the CJI asked him to mention the matter before him for hearing.
Justice Khanna told Singhvi that since it was a writ petition and would have to go before the three-judge special bench, which dealt with similar connected issues.
Justice Khanna then said that the special bench will assemble today after hearing the regular bench matters.
The petition was filed by Kejriwal, challenging the arrest by the ED last night subsequent to his arrest.
On Thursday, the Delhi High Court refused to grant Kejriwal any protection from coercive action in an excise policy-linked money laundering case.
It had listed the AAP leader’s application seeking protection for further consideration on April 22 when his main petition challenging the summons is fixed for hearing, and asked the Enforcement Directorate to file its response.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) placed before the court the documents pertaining to the probe and said there was material to show the necessity to call Kejriwal for questioning.
Kejriwal had moved the court in the wake of the ninth issued by the ED, asking him to appear before it on Thursday.
The case pertains to alleged corruption and money laundering in formulating and executing the Delhi government’s excise policy for 2021-22, which was later scrapped. AAP leaders Manish Sisodia and Sanjay Singh are in judicial custody in the case.
The name of Kejriwal has been mentioned multiple times in the chargesheets filed by the ED. The agency has alleged that the accused were in touch with Kejriwal for formulating the excise policy that resulted in undue benefits to them in return for which they paid kickbacks to the party.