Sisodia moves HC seeking bail in CBI, ED cases

New Delhi : Former Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia approached the high court on Thursday seeking bail in the corruption and money-laundering cases lodged by the CBI and the ED respectively in relation to the alleged excise policy scam.

The bail pleas are scheduled for hearing before Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma on Friday. Sisodia approached the high court after a trial court refused to grant him bail in the matter on April 30.

The bail pleas were mentioned by the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader’s counsel before a bench of Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet P S Arora for an urgent hearing, which agreed to list the same for Friday. “Let the judge go through the file. So let it come tomorrow,” the bench said.

Advocates Rajat Bhardwaj and Mohammad Irshad, representing Sisodia, told the bench that the petitioner is an MLA and requested that both the pleas seeking bail be listed for an urgent hearing.

The trial court had dismissed Sisodia’s bail pleas in the corruption and money-laundering cases lodged by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Enforcement Directorate (ED) respectively in connection with alleged irregularities in the formulation and execution of the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy for 2021-22. The beneficiaries diverted “illegal” gains to the accused officials and made false entries in their books of account to evade detection, the probe agencies have alleged. The special judge had, in the April 30 order, denied the relief, saying the stage is not right to grant bail to Sisodia.

The AAP leader was arrested by the CBI on February 26, 2023 for his alleged role in the “scam”. The ED arrested the former deputy chief minister in a money-laundering case stemming from the CBI FIR on March 9, 2023. Sisodia resigned from the Delhi cabinet on February 28, 2023.

The high court had dismissed Sisodia’s bail pleas in the CBI and ED cases on May 30 and July 3 last year respectively. On October 30, 2023, the Supreme Court also refused to interfere with the high court’s verdict, saying the allegation by the probe agencies that “windfall gains” of Rs 338 crore were made by a few wholesale liquor distributors was “tentatively supported” by material and evidence.