Manish Sisodia bail judgment highlights | SC affirms Sisodia’s ‘right to a speedy trial’

Justice Gavai expressly declines an oral plea by ED/CBI to bar Mr. Sisodia from the Delhi Secretariat.

Additional Solicitor General SV Raju seeks liberty to move SC for cancellation of bail if Mr. Sisodia comes to his former office.

SC does not specifically address the issue. Only says that there is hardly any possibility of Sisodia fleeing the country or tampering with the evidence.

SC observes that the procedure should not become the punishment and that the right to bail should not suffer due to delay in trial.

“A citizen cannot be made to run from pillar to post for bail. Sisodia cannot again start from square one, the trial court, and climb up the ladder till the Supreme Court for bail. Grant of bail is not a snake and ladder game”, the judges assert.?

SC grants the former Delhi Deputy Chief Minister bail in both ED and CBI cases in the excise policy case. Orders him to be released on payment of ? 10 lakh in bail bonds. He has to surrender his passport and report to the police station every Monday. Not to tamper with evidence or influence witnesses.

Justice Gavai says “in matters of liberty, everyday counts”.?

SC notes that the AAP leader has suffered incarceration of 17 months and that the trial has not yet commenced.?

“The appellant has been deprived of the right to a speedy trial”, it underscores.?

The Court notes that the trial Court and the High Court ought to have given due weightage to this.?

Dismissing the contentions of the ED and CBI that the delay in the trial can be attributed to Mr. Sisodia, Justice Gavai says -?

“When we specifically asked the ASG to show any order where the trial Court found any application to be frivolous, not one was shown. We find that the finding of delay by the appellant is not supported by the record.”?

The judge adds that it cannot be expected that the accused will not need reasonable time to inspect documents.?

SC says that the impugned orders of the trial court and the High Court have not taken into consideration the delay in trial.?

It underscores that the rigours of ?Section 45 of the PMLA? (grounds for bail) can be relaxed when there has been prolonged incarceration of the accused.?

SC says that relegating the Deputy CM to the trial court for relief would be a “travesty of justice”.?

“A citizen cannot be made to run from pillar to post. June 4 order recorded that it did not go into merits...Procedures cannot be made a mistress of justice”, Justice Gavai says while dismissing the central agencies’ preliminary objections to the bail pleas.?

Justice Gavai notes that the Supreme Court in its order on June 4 had recorded an undertaking from Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, who appeared for both the CBI and the ED, that the final charge sheet/prosecution complaint would be filed in the trial court on or before July 3, 2024.?

The Bench has assembled. The pronouncement of the verdict has begun.?

Mr. SV Raju appearing on behalf of the ED and CBI said the delay came from the accused, (Mr. Sisodia) who had sought one document after the other in court.

”Our trial would have commenced and these documents were unwarranted but just because of these applications. Delay is completely attributable to them and not to the agency. Speedy trial cannot be fitted in a straightjacket formula. It is case-by-case basis and they do not want this to be heard on merits. So the best option [for them] is to delay it,” Mr. Raju apprised the Supreme Court.?

But Justice Viswanathan replied that had the accused been on bail, he would have tried to delay the trial. But that was not the case here.

”Delay may happen on their (the accused side) part if they are bail,” Justice Viswanathan reasoned. Mr. Raju said the accused could also deliberately delay the trial and use the situation to seek bail. The law officer said that among the 400-odd witnesses, the ED could have the important ones to testify first.

Read more here.?

The Supreme Court noted that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has to establish an unbroken chain of evidence linking former Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia with the liquor lobby in the excise scam case.

“You have to establish a chain. The money has to flow from the liquor lobby to the person. We know it is difficult to establish the chain as everything is done undercover… but that is where your competence lies,” Justice Sanjiv Khanna, who headed the Bench, addressed Additional Solicitor General S.V. Raju, appearing for the ED.

The court observed that except a statement made by businessman Dinesh Arora, an accused-turned-approver in the case, there was no proof against Mr. Sisodia.

Read more here.?

The Delhi High Court on May 30 rejected bail plea of former Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, arrested in connection with the Delhi Excise Policy case, noting there are “serious allegations of misconduct” against him.

Justice Dinesh Kumar Sharma said that statement of the concerned excise officers have been relied upon by the CBI in connection with its probe into the case.

Read more here.?

Delhi excise policy case | HC rejects Manish Sisodia’s bail plea

The CBI had arrested Mr. Sisodia for alleged corruption in the formulation and implementation of the now-scrapped Delhi Excise Policy 2021-22 on February 26 following several rounds of questioning

Read The Hindu’s profile of the AAP leader here.?

Manish Sisodia | AAP’s Minister of everything

On February 26, the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested Manish Sisodia — Number 2 in both the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Delhi government — and he has remained in jail since then

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has named former Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia as an accused in a 2,371-page chargesheet in connection with the now-scrapped excise policy case.

In its fifth chargesheet, filed before a Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) court in Delhi, the probe agency named Mr. Sisodia the 29th accused in the alleged liquor scam. It has called the former Deputy CM a “key conspirator” in the case.

Read more here.?

Excise policy case: ED names Manish Sisodia in supplementary chargesheet

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has named former Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia as an accused in a 2,371-page chargesheet in connection with the now-scrapped excise policy case.