'If We Pass An Order Now...': SC Defers Decision on Arvind Kejriwal Bail Over Pending Delhi HC Order

The Supreme Court on Monday fixed June 26 for hearing Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s plea against the Delhi High Court order putting an interim stay on his bail in the money laundering case linked to the alleged excise scam. The top court said, “If we pass an order now, we will be prejudging the issue.”

A vacation bench of Justices Manoj Misra and SVN Bhatti said it would like to wait for the pronouncement of the high court order on the issue. Senior Advocate Abhishek Singhvi, appearing for Kejriwal, sought vacating of the interim stay on the bail order. Additional Solicitor General (ASG) S V Raju, appearing for the ED, opposed the plea of Kejriwal, and said the high court is about to pronounce the verdict on its stay application.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener, who was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on March 21, could have walked out of Tihar jail on Friday last had the high court not granted the interim stay relief to the federal anti-money laundering agency. The high court had listed the plea for hearing on July 10. The court had said it was reserving the order for two-three days as it wanted to go through the entire case records. It also issued a notice to Kejriwal seeking his response to the ED’s plea challenging the trial court’s June 20 order by which he was granted bail.

ASG Raju, appearing for the ED in the high court, had contended that the trial court’s order was “perverse”, “one-sided” and “wrong-sided” and that the findings were based on irrelevant facts. The relevant facts, he claimed, were not considered by the special judge. Seeking a stay on the trial court’s order, Raju had contended that the ED was not given adequate opportunity to argue its case.

The ED’s application for stay was vehemently opposed by senior advocates Abhishek Singhvi and Vikram Chaudhari, representing Kejriwal. They had submitted that Article 21 (protection of life and personal liberty) of the Constitution does not exist for the ED for which the liberty of a person is figured low in priority.

In its bail order, the trial court had held that prima facie, Kejriwal’s guilt was yet to be established and that the ED had failed to furnish direct evidence linking him to the proceeds of crime in the money laundering case. The excise policy was scrapped in 2022 after the Delhi lieutenant governor ordered a CBI probe into alleged irregularities and corruption involving its formulation and execution.