NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court will hear on July 14, Former Delhi Minister Manish Sisodia’s plea seeking bail in the multi-crore scam of Delhi Liquor policy.
Sisodia who has been in custody in the multi-crore scam of the now scrapped Delhi Liquor policy has approached Supreme Court against Delhi HCs orders of refusing to grant him bail in the cases registered by the CBI and ED.
His plea was mentioned by Senior Advocate AM Singhvi before the bench of CJI DY Chandrachud and Justice PS Narasimha. Urging the court to consider his plea, Singhvi said, “His wife is not well. If it can be on July 14.”
Sisodia was arrested on February 26 by CBI hours nearly eight hours after questioning pursuant to an FIR registered against him on August 17, 2022 under section 120B of IPC read with Section 477 IPC and section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988. Apart from the CBI case, he was also taken into custody by the ED on March 9 in a money laundering case.
Seeking bail, he in his plea before the SC has said that charges in the chargesheet that has already been filed by the CBI are punishable with imprisonment of less than seven years. It has also been contended that the probe conducted so far has not traced any proceeds of crime to him and he thus deserves to be granted bail in the absence of evidence.
The plea challenges Delhi HCs July 3 and May 30 order passed by Justice Dinesh Kumar Sharma of rejecting him bail in the cases registered against him by ED and CBI respectively.
While denying him bail in the CBI case, Justice Sharma had termed while terming allegations of misconduct against him “serious” had said that the excise policy was formed at the instance of the “South Group” with malafide intention to give undue advantage to them. HC in its order had said, “The gravity and the allegations do not entitle the accused to be admitted to bail. This court, as has discussed above, is clear of the fact that the excise policy has not been examined in the present proceedings nor the powers of the government regarding the framing of the economic policies.
However, since there are serious allegations of misconduct against the petitioner, the petitioner being an influential person and having held the position of Deputy Chief Minister having 18 portfolios and the witnesses are mostly public servants, there is a possibility of the witnesses being influenced cannot be ruled out.” Additionally, Justice Sharma while denying him bail in the ED case had said that Sisodia didn’t meet the twin conditions for the grant of bail under PMLA as well as the triple test for the grant of bail.
Justice Sharma also underlined that the special judge’s order was well reasoned and relieved on the basis of material on record and didn’t suffer from any illegality or infirmity.
