The Supreme Court on Monday adjourned the hearing in jailed Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal's plea against stay on his bail by the Delhi High Court in the Delhi Liquor Policy. The top court will now hear the matter on Wednesday.
A vacation bench comprising Justices Manoj Misra and SVN Bhatti heard the matter today and said let the high court come out with the order. The high court had reserved an order over stay on bail while pausing Kejriwal's release till it pronounces order on the same. The top court today noted that ED and Kejriwal's counsel were to submit short submissions on the stay application to the high court and the order on the same is likely to come by tomorrow.
The bench said that let the high court order come out tomorrow.
During the proceedings, Justice Misra remarked that reserving of the order in stay application by the high court was a "bit unusual".
"Normally on stay applications, orders are not reserved. They are passed at the hearing itself, on the spot." Justice Misra said.
Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi appearing for Arvind Kejriwal submitted in the court that the procedure of staying the bail on the first day that was just mentioned was unprecedented.
"The balance of convenience is in my favour as he has already surrendered once before on orders of the Supreme Court," Singhvi said while emphasising that there was no flight risk for Kejriwal.
"Why can't I be free till the high court decides on an interim stay sought by the ED. I am not at flight risk. I have a judgement in my favour," Singhvi states. He contended that if the high court can pause release before passing on stay order on the bail, the Supreme Court also can reverse the order like that.
The top court however said that if at all the high court has committed a mistake, that does not mean the Supreme Court should also do that.
ASG SV Raju while appearing for the ED contended that the trial court order was perverse and he further requested the court to let the high court complete the proceedings.
The counsel appearing for Kejriwal also told the court that the high court paused the stay by hearing a10:30 mentioning when in fact the plea should have been routed through registrar.
"No paper work followed in listing. The trial court order was not even uploaded and the high court stayed it," the counsel told the top court.
The top court said that it is not commenting on the merits of the case for now and will wait for the high court to pass an order by tomorrow and thus listed the matter for further hearing on Wednesday.
On Friday, the Delhi High Court paused the release of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convenor after the trial court granted him bail on June 20. In its bail order, the trial court had held that prima facie, Kejriwal's guilt was yet to be established and that the ED had failed to furnish direct evidence linking him to the proceeds of crime in the money-laundering case.
Kejriwal was arrested by the ED on March 21, and could have walked out of Tihar Jail on Friday. However, the ED approached the high court against the trial court order.
The high court put an interim stay on his bail and directed the parties to file written submissions by June 24. The trial court had granted Kejriwal bail after hearing the case on merits.
The high court said it wanted to go through the entire case records and issued a notice to Kejriwal seeking his response to the ED's plea challenging the trial court's June 20 order by which he was granted bail. The court had listed the plea for hearing on July 10.