On Monday, July 29, the Supreme Court will hear the bail arguments of Aam Admi Party (AAP) leader Manish Sisodia on the purported Delhi excise policy fraud. Manish Sisodia was arrested in February 2023 and has been detained for 16 months. His bail requests will be heard by a bench consisting of Justices BR Gavai and KV Viswanathan.
In July 2022, Delhi Chief Secretary Naresh Kuma delivered a report to Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena in which it was claimed that Manish Sisodia had used payments from licensees who sold alcohol to finance the AAP’s Punjab election campaign in 2022.
The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) detained Manish Sisodia, the deputy chief minister of Delhi at the time, on February 26, 2023, in connection with the purported Delhi excise policy scandal. He was under sections related to criminal conspiracy (120B), intent to defraud (477A) and Section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act.
The FIR filed against him, accused the AAP leader of being “instrumental in recommending and taking decisions pertaining to excise policy for the year 2021-22 without the approval of competent authority with an intention to extend undue favours to the licensee post tender”
Manish Sisodia was detained by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on March 9 in connection with a money laundering case that was related to the initial claim that he used kickbacks from the excise policy to finance the party’s 2022 Punjab election campaign. This arrest came shortly after his detention by the CBI.
On February 28, 2023, Manish Sisodia and another AAP politician, Satyendar Jain, who was also detained on corruption-related accusations, submitted their resignations from the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi administration.
The Supreme Court rejected Manish Sisodia bail in both of his bail requests on October 30, 2023, citing “tentative evidence” that bolstered the allegations that wholesale spirits merchants had profited Rs. 338 crores from the excise policy. The court also said that Sisodia could apply for bail again in case trial was extended or change in evidence was discovered.
After a trial judge denied Sisodia’s bail requests on April 30, 2024, he filed an appeal with the Delhi High judge, which denied his requests on May 21. The Supreme Court affirmed the lower courts’ ruling as well.
For sixteen months, the former deputy chief minister of Delhi has been detained by the courts. The trial would only take six to eight months, as the ED had told the supreme court.
The Supreme Court had rejected, on June 4, 2024, Sisodia’s application to revive his bail pleas, saying that he needed to wait until the ED and the CBI file their prosecution complaint and chargesheet, respectively.
It was intended that the prosecution’s complaint and chargesheet be turned in by July 3 at the latest. The supreme court decided on July 16 to hear Manish Sisodia’s bail requests as well as the ED and CBI’s responses because these documents had not been filed.
