April 10 (Punjab Khabarnama) : Delhi high court on Tuesday rejected chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s plea challenging his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in the excise policy case.
The high court stated that the central agency was in possession of enough material that led them to arrest Kejriwal. The delay caused by the chief minister also impacted those who were in custody.
“Non joining of Kejriwal was a contributory factor & not the only factor,” the high court said.
The court in its order said that doubting or casting aspersions on the manner of recording statement of approver amounts to casting aspersions on the judge & the court.
Further, the court said that MS Reddy and Sarath Reddy gave statements out of free will. The court said it “cannot step into the shoes of trial court & conduct a mini trial”.
“The petitioner has been arrested in a money laundering case & the courts have to consider the same with regards to the law in the absence of timing of arrest. Kejriwal would have known when Lok Sabha elections would be declared and he would then have been very busy. It cannot be held that the arrest timing was decided by ED,” the high court judge said.
The court also said that political considerations and equations cannot be broaden in law as they are not relevant to court proceedings. “The matter before this court is not between the Centre & Kejriwal, but between the petitioner & the ED,” the court said.
“The files and the material which were placed before this court reveals that the petitioner herein was granted all the mandate of law in Pankaj Bansal case. The order passed by the court was not a 2 line order but a reasoned order,” the court said.
While rejecting the petition, the high court said that ED was able to trace enough material in the form of the statements of the approval, hawala dealer and an Aam Aadmi Party candidate in the 2022 Goa election.
Additional solicitor general SV Raju, while appearing for the ED, said,”Today the judge gave the judgement after seeing all the evidence and the court also said that money trail has been found. Court has done justice today and the court said that the arrest of (CM Kejriwal) is legal.”
