Delhi High Court Gives AAP Leaders Final Two Weeks to Reply in Liquor Policy Case
The Delhi High Court on Thursday, July 16, granted a final two-week opportunity to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leaders Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, and Durgesh Pathak to respond to the Central Bureau of Investigation's (CBI) plea. The CBI is challenging a trial court order that discharged the leaders in the Delhi liquor policy case.
Justice Manoj Jain deferred the hearing on the CBI’s revision petition after no counsel appeared for the discharged accused. The absence was due to a work abstention by High Court lawyers, who were protesting against the proposed enhancement of the pecuniary jurisdiction of Delhi’s district courts. The court has now listed the case to hear arguments from the investigating agency on August 17.
During the hearing, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, representing the CBI, argued that the three AAP leaders had already been given several opportunities by the High Court to file their replies. Mehta stated that the resolution of the case has been sufficiently delayed.
In response, Justice Jain stated that the court would make it clear that the accused would be at liberty to file their replies before the next date. The judge added that a time frame would be fixed for hearing submissions on behalf of the discharged accused persons.
Justice Jain noted in the court order that although opportunities were granted to them earlier on several occasions, one last and final opportunity was being granted in the interest of justice to file replies within two weeks.
The hearing had previously been deferred on May 25 to July 16 to await the presence of counsel for the unrepresented AAP leaders. The leaders had earlier boycotted a hearing before Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma. The excise policy case was reassigned to Justice Jain after Justice Sharma released it from her board. This followed her initiation of contempt action against Kejriwal, Sisodia, Pathak, and others for their alleged vilifying social media posts against her.
