Supreme Court says it may pass interim order on Arvind Kejriwal’s bail on May 10

The Supreme Court on Wednesday said it may pass an order on Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s bail plea on May 10, Friday. Justice Sanjiv Khanna told this to ASG SV Raju during a hearing, news agency PTI reported.

The Supreme Court heard Kejriwal’s bail plea on Tuesday and reserved the order. During the hearing, the top court said it did not want Kejriwal to discharge his official duties if he was released on interim bail in view of the election. Kejriwal’s counsel Abhishek Singhvi submitted that Kejriwal won’t sign any official files if released on interim bail provided the Delhi lieutenant governor does not reject decisions just because the files were not signed by him.

“Suppose we grant you interim bail on account of elections. Then if you say you will attend office, it may have a cascading effect. If we give you interim bail, we don’t want you to perform official duties as somewhere it will lead to a conflict of interest. We don’t want your interference at all in the working of the government,” the bench told Singhvi.

“First let us see whether at all interim bail can be given or not,” the bench told Kejriwal’s counsel.

The Enforcement Directorate opposed Kejriwal’s bail plea and said no leniency should be shown to Kejriwal because of the election and granting interim bail to him would amount to creating a separate class for politicians.

“We are not going by whether it is a case of a politician or not a politician. Every particular individual involved has some special or exceptional case or circumstance. We are only considering whether this case requires an exception or if the person involved is in that exceptional circumstance, given the fact that elections are around the corner, that’s all,” the bench said.

“There are around 5,000 cases involving MPs pending across the country at this time. Will all of them be released on bail? Is an agriculturist who has a harvesting and sowing season less important than a politician?” Solicitor General Tushar Mehta submitted appearing for the ED.