‘I was shouting and…’: Swati Maliwal’s claim on CCTV footage at Delhi CM house

Swati Maliwal, Aam Aadmi Party’s Rajya Sabha MP, on Saturday night claimed that the CCTV camera footage of the May 13 incident where she was allegedly assaulted by Arvind Kejriwal’s aide Bibhav Kumar at the chief minister residence has “disappeared” and edited videos were being released.

Bibhav Kumar was arrested in connection with the alleged assault on Swati Maliwal and sent a five-day police custody by Delhi’s Tis Hazari Court on Saturday night.

“First I was thrashed brutally by Bibhav. He slapped and kicked me. When I freed myself and called 112, he went outside, called security personnel and started making a video. I was shouting and telling the security that Bibhav has thrashed me brutally,” Swati Maliwal claimed in a post in Hindi on X (formally Twitter).

“That long portion of the video has been edited. Only a 50-second video was released when I was fed up of telling the security… Now the phone has been formatted and the full video deleted? The CCTV camera footage has also disappeared. This is the height of conspiracy,” Swati Maliwal added.

Bibhav Kumar did not provide phone password: Delhi Police

Swati Maliwal’s reaction comes even as Bibhav Kumar was on Saturday produced before the magisterial court, with police contending that his custody was necessary for questioning him about the reason behind the alleged assault on the Rajya Sabha MP.

The Delhi Police alleged that Bibhav Kumar did not provide the password of his mobile phone to the investigating agency and had also informed them that his phone had been formatted in Mumbai due to malfunctioning.

The police said before being formatted, the data of a mobile phone had to be cloned, and Bibhav Kumar was required to be taken to Mumbai to retrieve the data.

The accused’s presence was also needed when an expert accessed his mobile phone, they said.

‘Swati Maliwal was brutally beaten and attacked’

Additional Public Prosecutor (APP) Atul Srivastava, seeking his police remand for seven days at a hearing late on Saturday evening, said, “He has been arrested today. The complainant is a public figure and an AAP MP,” the APP submitted. “She was brutally beaten and attacked in sensitive parts,” he added.

“We asked for the DVR, which was provided on a pen drive. The footage was found to be blank,” APP argued.

APP submitted that an iPhone has been given to the police, but now the accused is not sharing the password and that the phone has been formatted. “The accused has influence over the witnesses. In this case, footage was deleted, the phone was formatted, and the accused himself reached the place of occurrence.”

The accused has not shared the password for his phone. He has to be taken to the expert to get the phone password. The phone has been formatted, and he has been taken to Mumbai, APP Srivastava added.

“He was terminated from the service. It is a question of how he was able to reach the CM’s residence,” the APP submitted, adding that we have to find out whether he is connected to anti-social elements or not.

Advocate Rajiv Mohan, appearing for Bibhav Kumar, pointed to the delay in filing the case and asked why Swati Maliwal was not taken for medical attention when she went to the police station shortly after the purported incident but left without filing a complaint.