Delhi excise policy cases: SC to hear AAP leader Manish Sisodia’s bail pleas on Monday

The Supreme Court on Monday will hear Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and former deputy chief minister of Delhi Manish Sisodia's bail pleas in corruption and money laundering cases linked to the alleged Delhi excise policy scam.

Sisodia has filed bail pleas contending that he has been in jail for 16 months and the trial against him has not made any progress since October last year.

According to the cause list of July 29 uploaded on the Supreme Court website, a bench of Justices BR Gavai and KV Viswanathan is slated to hear Sisodia's bail pleas.

On July 16, the SC had agreed to hear the pleas and sought responses from the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

The AAP leader was arrested by the CBI on February 26, 2023 in connection with alleged irregularities in the formulation and implementation of the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy 2021-22.

The ED had arrested him in the money laundering case stemming from the CBI FIR on March 9 last year.

After being arrested Sisodia had resigned from the Delhi cabinet on February 28 last year.

His pleas has said that the law officer, appearing for the probe agencies, had told the SC on June 4 that the charge sheet and the prosecution complaint in the main excise policy case and the linked money laundering case, respectively, would be filed on or before July 3.

On June 4, the apex court had refused to entertain Sisodia's bail pleas in the two cases.

It had said that Sisodia could revive his petitions for bail after the ED and the CBI file the final prosecution complaint and the charge sheet, respectively, in these cases.

Sisodia had earlier moved the apex court challenging the Delhi High Court's May 21 order dismissing his bail pleas. He had challenged in the high court a trial court's April 30 order rejecting his bail applications in the two cases.