Kejriwal to remain in jail, High Court stays trial court's bail order

New Delhi, June 25 (HS): Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal will have to remain in jail for now. Delhi High Court has stayed the bail granted to him by the trial court in the Delhi Excise Scam case. Justice Sudhir Kumar Jain's vacation bench said that the trial court's order is not correct. It should have looked at all the documents.

The High Court said that the trial court has not followed the two conditions of Section 45 of the Money Laundering Act. The trial court should give ED enough opportunity to present arguments. The trial court did not take the earlier orders of the Supreme Court correctly. The High Court said that Kejriwal was given interim bail by the Supreme Court for election campaign. In such a situation, that order cannot be cited for personal freedom.

The High Court had reserved the decision on June 21. During the hearing, the ED had said that the entire order of the trial court is wrong. According to the ED, the trial court did not consider the arguments and evidence of the ED at all and did not give a decision according to the law. The ED had said that the evidence collected against Arvind Kejriwal after 2023 was not considered and the decision was given. The ED had said that it ordered bail to Kejriwal ignoring the statements of 13 Aam Aadmi Party workers and officials of Angadia, Goa.

The ED had said that the condition of section 45 of the Money Laundering Act was violated by not giving it adequate opportunity to oppose the bail during the hearing in the trial court. On June 24, the Supreme Court had deferred the hearing till June 26 on the petition filed by Kejriwal against the High Court's order to put an interim stay on the trial court's bail order.