Arvind Kejriwal withdraws in Delhi High Court plea against ED summonses in excise policy case

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Thursday permitted AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal to withdraw his petition challenging the summonses issued to him by the ED in connection with its probe into an excise policy-linked money laundering case.

Senior counsel appearing for the former Delhi chief minister said he did not wish to pursue the matter further as he had already been acquitted in the criminal cases against him for failing to appear before the agency in pursuance of the summonses.

Additional Solicitor General S V Raju, appearing for the Enforcement Directorate (ED), said the agency will file an appeal against the decision of the trial court.

"Much water has flown.. I will not press the petition. I will take the constitutional pleas at an appropriate stage," Kejriwal's senior lawyer said.

"Accordingly, the petition is dismissed as withdrawn", a bench of Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya and Justice Tejas Karia said.

The bench clarified that all the legal pleas in the petition were kept open.

On January 22, the trial court acquitted Kejriwal in two separate cases lodged against him for not appearing before the ED in pursuance of the summonses asking him to join the probe in the alleged excise policy scam.

Observing that the accused was a serving chief minister and "he too enjoyed his fundamental right of movement", the trial court held that "the legal challenge to due service of summons is maintainable" and ED failed to prove that Kejriwal intentionally disobeyed the summonses.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener had approached the high court in this matter in the wake of the ninth summons issued by the ED asking him to appear before it on March 21, 2024.

The high court bench had on March 20, 2024 asked the ED to file its reply with respect to the maintainability of the petition.

The next day, it asked the ED to also respond to Kejriwal's plea seeking protection from arrest, saying "at this stage" it was not inclined to grant him any interim relief. Kejriwal was arrested by the ED later that evening.

Kejriwal is presently on interim bail in the money laundering case, with the Supreme Court referring questions on the aspect of "need and necessity of arrest" under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to a larger bench for in-depth consideration.

After being arrested by the CBI in the alleged corruption case on June 26, 2024, he was granted bail in the matter on September 13, 2024 by the top court.

The ED has alleged that other accused in the case were in touch with Kejriwal for formulating the now-scrapped excise policy that resulted in undue benefits to them and kickbacks to AAP.

In his petition, Kejriwal also challenged the constitutional validity of certain provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) with respect to arrest, questioning and grant of bail.

He raised several issues, including whether a political party is covered under the anti-money laundering law.

It alleged that "arbitrary procedure" under PMLA was being used to create a non-level playing field for the general elections to "skew the electoral process in the favour of the ruling party at the Centre".

Stating the petitioner is a "vocal critic" of the ruling party and a partner of the opposition INDIA bloc, the plea claimed that the ED, being under control of the Union government, has been "weaponised".