NN News Desk:
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal today withdrew from the Indian Supreme Court the plea against his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in the liquor policy-linked money laundering case.
Kejriwal’s lawyer said he would contest the remand proceedings before the trial court and then come back to the apex court with another petition, reports our New Delhi correspondent.
Senior advocate Abhishek Singhvi, representing Kejriwal, mentioned the matter before a bench headed by Justice Sanjiv Khanna and said since the remand proceedings before the trial court later in the day will be clashing with the hearing in the top court, Kejriwal be allowed to withdraw the plea.
The move by Kejriwal, who was arrested by the Indian anti-money laundering probe agency last night, came hours after Justice Khanna had told Singhvi that Kejriwal’s petition against his arrest would be heard by a three-judge bench during the day.
Kejriwal had moved the Supreme Court late yesterday following the arrest. He was arrested hours after the Delhi High Court refused to grant protection to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAM) national convenor from any coercive action by the agency.
Earlier in the day, India’s Supreme Court refused to grant bail to Bharat Rastriya Samithi leader K Kavitha who has been arrested by anti-money laundering agency ED in the Delhi excise policy scam case.
ED claims Kavitha ‘conspired’ with top AAP leaders, including Arvind Kejriwal and his former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, to get favours in the Delhi liquor policy by paying Rs 100 crore to the political party. Kavitha has refuted the allegations and has termed ED’s actions against her as “illegal.”
A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna, M M Sundresh and Bela M Trivedi asked Kavitha to approach the trial court, saying it is a practice that this court is following and cannot bypass the protocol.
The bench said as far as Kavitha’s plea challenging the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) is concerned, the court is issuing notice to the ED and seeking its response in six weeks.
Kavitha, a member of the Telangana Legislative Council and daughter of former Telangana state chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao, was arrested on March 15 and remanded to ED’s custody till March 23 in the case.
