The Enforcement Directorate told the Delhi High Court on Thursday that it will challenge former Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s acquittal in cases about him not appearing before the agency after its summons in the liquor policy case, Live Law reported.
Additional Solicitor General SV Raju said this after Kejriwal’s counsel sought to withdraw a plea challenging the summons issued to the Aam Aadmi Party chief in the matter.
Kejriwal’s counsel told the High Court that he did not want to pursue the matter further as he had already been acquitted in the criminal cases against him for failing to appear before the Enforcement Directorate, PTI reported.
The High Court allowed Kejriwal to withdraw the plea.
On January 22, a trial court acquitted the former chief minister in two separate cases filed against him for not appearing before the Enforcement Directorate, PTI reported.
The trial court held that as a serving chief minister, “he too enjoyed his fundamental right of movement” and that the Enforcement Directorate failed to prove that Kejriwal intentionally disobeyed the summons.
Kejriwal was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate in March 2024. Till then, he had been summoned nine times by the law enforcement agency in connection with alleged irregularities in the Delhi government’s now-scrapped liquor excise policy.
The chief minister had skipped all nine summonses.
Kejriwal was granted bail in his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate by a trial court on June 20, 2024. The Delhi High Court, however, issued an interim stay on the order the next day as it allowed an urgent hearing of a petition by the central agency.
On June 25, 2024, the High Court stayed the bail in its final order and said that the trial court “did not properly appreciate the material on record and the averments of ED [Enforcement Directorate]”.
On July 12, 2024, the Supreme Court granted Kejriwal interim bail in the case. However, he remained in jail as he had been arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation in the same case on June 25, 2024.
He was eventually released from jail in September 2024 after the Supreme Court granted him bail.
Liquor policy case
The Enforcement Directorate’s case is based on a first information report registered by the CBI alleging irregularities in the Delhi government’s liquor excise policy, which has been scrapped.
The policy came into effect in November 2021. It was withdrawn on July 30, 2022, with Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena recommending an investigation into the alleged irregularities of the policy.
The two central agencies have alleged that Delhi’s Aam Aadmi Party government at the time modified the liquor policy by increasing the commission for wholesalers from 5% to 12%. This allegedly facilitated the receipt of bribes from wholesalers who had a substantial market share and turnover.
Also read: A ‘liquor scam’ has put AAP leaders in jail. But has it dented the party’s image in Delhi?
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