The Supreme Court will hear tomorrow a bail petition moved by former Delhi Deputy CM and AAP leader Manish Sisodia in connection with the alleged money laundering scam in liquor policy case. After the Delhi High Court rejected both interim and regular bail pleas moved by Sisodia, he moved the top court.
A vacation bench of Justices Aravind Kumar and Sandeep Mehta will hear the matter.
In October 2023, the top court had rejected Sisodia's bail petition in the Delhi Liquor policy case. It may be recalled that the Supreme Court while rejecting Sisodia’s bail in October 2023 had said that he can move a fresh bail application before the trial court if the trial is protracted and proceeds at a “snail’s pace” in the next three months.
Sisodia had moved one regular bail plea and one interim bail plea in the trial court to take care of his ailing wife. However, the trial court rejected both the petitions and held that Sisodia was causing deliberate delay in the case, and despite all efforts by the accused persons to delay the case, the trial in the case could not be said to be protracted or proceeding at a snail's pace.
The trial court judge Justice Kaveri Baweja had rejected Sisodia regular and interim bail pleas and observed, Sisodia individually, and along with different accused has been filing one or the other application/making oral submissions frequently, some of them frivolous, that too on a piecemeal basis, apparently as a concerted effort for accomplishing the shared purpose of causing delay in the matter.
Sisodia then challenged the trial court order in the high court. The Delhi High Court on May 21, rejected the bail plea moved by the former Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia in the ED and CBI cases in the alleged Delhi Liquor Policy scam.
The high court while rejecting his bail plea observed that Sisodia fabricated and manufactured public opinion to suit his goal and subverted the process of making the excise policy by deviating from the expert committee report constituted by him. The court made scathing observations and said that Sisodia betrayed democratic principles by breaking the public's trust.
The high court also held that the observation made by the trial court saying that the delay in the case was actually caused by Sisodia and other co-accused in a concerted effort was not justified. The high court judge also said that there is also no delay by ED, CBI or trial court in the time taken in investigating this case.