Kejriwal moves Delhi HC, calls CBI arrest ‘illegal’

Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday approached the Delhi high court challenging his arrest and remand by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in connection with alleged irregularities in the scrapped 2021-22 Delhi excise policy.

In his petition before the high court, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener, while calling his arrest “illegal”, sought that a Delhi special court’s June 26 and June 29 orders be set aside.

On June 26, a city court sent the CM to three-day CBI custody, saying that the remand was warranted as the probe agency had taken court’s permission before examining Kejriwal, and based upon the interrogation report, found the necessity to arrest him. In a June 29 order, the city court remanded the AAP chief to 14 days in judicial custody.

The plea, filed through advocates Vivek Jain and Mohd Irshad, claimed that Kejriwal’s arrest was illegal since it was in contravention of the guidelines laid down by the Supreme Court’s ruling in Arnesh Kumar vs State of Bihar and Section 41A of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) which mandates the investigating officer to issue notice to the person accused of committing an offence before making an arrest without warrant. In the Arnesh Kumar ruling, the Supreme Court formulated guidelines to prevent unnecessary arrests.

The petition went on to add that the Delhi court failed to satisfy itself about how Kejriwal’s arrest was necessitated, and erred in law in appreciating that CBI failed to abide by the conditions laid down under Section 41 of CrPC while taking him in custody. The provision allows the police to make arrests with a warrant or permission from a magistrate in cases where it is necessary to prevent a person from committing a further offence or for proper investigation.

In the remand note, CBI alleged that Kejriwal’s arrest was necessitated by him remaining “evasive, non-cooperative” and failing to give satisfactory replies to the questions raised to him regarding his role in an alleged kickback demand of ₹100 crore, the acceptance and delivery of this amount to the AAP through his close associate Vijay Nair, and the utilisation of a part of the ill-gotten money for the party’s Goa elections campaign.

Kejriwal has denied all charges, and his plea before the high court stated that mere non-cooperation is not a ground to statutorily available to arrest a person.

“That the present case in the arrest memo dated 26.06.2024 the grounds of arrest merely stated that Petitioner is not co-operating with investigation and not disclosing the facts which are in his knowledge. The same cannot be a ground of arrest and a mere non- cooperation is not the ground statutorily available to arrest the person,” the plea read.

It added that the probe agency has not pointed towards any “new evidence” or “material” in the arrest memo or remand note to justify the CM’s arrest in judicial custody.

“There is no new material which has come in the possession of the CBI 04.06.2024 which demonstrate that there was any justifiable reason or explanation basis which the permission was sought to investigate the Petitioner on 25.06.2024 and then subsequently arrest the Petitioner solely on the ground that the response of the Petitioner is evasive. This only shows malice on the part of CBI which is to create a frivolous impression for arresting the Petitioner,” the plea said.

The probe agency arrested Kejriewal in the Rouse Avenue court on June 26 while he was already in judicial custody in a related Enforcement Directorate case over the scrapped excise policy.

CBI has filed four charge sheets in the case against 17 accused persons, including former deputy CM Sisodia and BRS leader K Kavitha, both of whom are in jail. Kejriwal has not been named as an accused in any of the indictments yet.