The Supreme Court on Monday will hear a plea filed by Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) supremo Arvind Kejriwal challenging his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and his subsequent remand in connection with the Delhi excise policy case.
A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta will be hearing the matter.
Arvind Kejriwal had moved the top court challenging a Delhi High Court judgment that dismissed his plea on April 9 and rejected his argument of political vendetta amid the upcoming Lok Sabha election.
According to the high court, the probe agency had sufficient materials to justify the arrest, adding that it was an “inevitable consequence of his non-cooperation” with the ED.
Notably, the probe agency had summoned Arvind Kejriwal nine times in the case, but he did not depose before it.
The HC verdict also observed that the central agency could not be blamed for choosing the timing of the chief minister’s arrest.
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The AAP leader was arrested on March 21 in connection with the money laundering probe linked to the alleged irregularities in the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy and was sent to judicial custody till April 15 in the last hearing. He is the first sitting CM to be arrested in the case. The CM is currently lodged in Tihar jail.