Daijiworld Media Network - New Delhi
New Delhi, Mar 14: Former Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia on Saturday furnished surety bonds of Rs 50,000 each before a court in the national capital after being discharged in the corruption case related to the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy.
The leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party appeared before the Rouse Avenue Court and submitted the bonds in compliance with an earlier order passed while relieving them of charges in the case investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation.
Under legal procedure, individuals who are discharged or acquitted in a criminal case must furnish surety bonds to ensure their presence before the court if the prosecution later challenges the order in a higher court.
In a detailed judgment spanning over 1,100 paragraphs, the trial court on February 27 discharged all accused, including Kejriwal and Sisodia, in connection with alleged irregularities linked to the formulation and implementation of the Delhi government’s excise policy introduced during the AAP administration.
The discharge order has since been challenged by the CBI before the Delhi High Court through a criminal revision petition. Earlier this week, a single-judge Bench headed by Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma issued notices to Kejriwal, Sisodia and other accused in response to the agency’s plea questioning the trial court’s decision not to frame charges.
During the proceedings, the High Court also stayed the trial court’s direction calling for departmental action against a CBI officer who had investigated the matter. The court further ordered that the remarks made by the trial court against the investigating agency and the officer would remain in abeyance.
The case relates to alleged irregularities in the formulation and implementation of the excise policy introduced by the then AAP-led Delhi government. The CBI had claimed the policy was designed to benefit certain private liquor companies in return for alleged bribes.
However, the trial court rejected the agency’s allegation of a larger conspiracy, stating that the available records indicated the policy had been formulated through a consultative process and in accordance with established procedures.
In a separate development, Kejriwal has submitted a representation to the chief justice of the Delhi High Court, Devendra Kumar Upadhyaya, seeking the transfer of the CBI’s revision petition from the Bench of Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma to another Bench.
The request urged the chief justice, who oversees the court’s roster allocation, to assign the matter to a different Bench.