The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Wednesday arrested Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal in the excise policy case. The Supreme Court, meanwhile, allowed the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief to file a fresh petition challenging the Delhi high court’s final order that stayed the trial court’s direction to grant him regular bail.
Advocate Vivek Jain, arguing for Arvind Kejriwal, said his legal team came to know about his interrogation inside the Tihar jail through the media. Claiming that the content and manner in which it had been done was of grave concern, he urged the court to defer the hearing.
Special public prosecutor SP Singh, who was representing the agency, said CBI would have arrested him before the elections but chose not to.
“We could’ve done the exercise before the elections but we did not. It was only after he went back, we sought permission. It is very unfortunate when a political dispensation does something of this sort where they are dealing with suitors before finalising the policy,” he said.
Singh argued that the agency didn’t need to inform the other party under the law.
He said to investigate “is my prerogative”.
The probe agency on Tuesday night examined the AAP supremo in Tihar Jail and recorded his statement in connection with the excise policy case.
The Delhi high court on Tuesday stayed Kejriwal’s bail order, saying that the trial court should have at least recorded its satisfaction with the fulfillment of the twin conditions of section 45 of the Prevention of the Money Laundering Act (PMLA) before passing the impugned order.
The vacation bench of Justice Sudhir Kumar Jain said that documents and arguments were not appreciated properly by the trial court.
After the CBI examined Kejriwal inside the jail, his lawyer alleged that the Narendra Modi government played “dirty tricks” to keep him in jail.”The dirty tricks of the Modi government fears the release of Arvind Kejriwal by SC has asked CBI to arrest him in the same manner almost a year after he joined the investigation. What it shows nothing changed the vindictive mindset of BJ. Shame,” he wrote on X.