New Delhi: Delhi High Court Thursday granted a final opportunity to former chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy Manish Sisodia and AAP functionary Durgesh Pathak, asking them to respond within two weeks to CBI’s plea against a trial court order discharging them in the liquor policy case.Justice Manoj Jain deferred hearing on CBI’s revision petition after none appeared for the discharged accused due to lawyers’ strike, and listed the case for hearing arguments on behalf of the investigating agency on Aug 17 and 18.Solicitor general Tushar Mehta, appearing for CBI, said the three AAP functionaries were earlier given several opportunities by the court and the case had been “sufficiently delayed”.“In any case if I am giving a date, we will make it clear that they would be at liberty to file a reply,” Justice Jain responded, adding that a time frame shall be fixed for hearing submissions on behalf of the discharged accused. “The report of the registry would indicate that so far no reply has been received from respondent nos. 8, 18 & 19. Although opportunity was granted to them earlier on several occasions, in view of interest of justice, one last and final opportunity is granted to them to file replies within two weeks from today,” HC directed.Mehta urged the court to set an earlier date in July or early Aug, remarking that the date fixed was “a little too long”, but HC said there were other cases pertaining to MP/MLAs pending in his court and it was not possible to accommodate CBI’s request. The court also asked the parties to file their written submissions.On May 25, the court had deferred the hearing till July 16 on CBI’s petition to await the presence of counsel on behalf of the unrepresented AAP functionaries, who had earlier boycotted the hearing before Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma.The excise policy case came before Justice Jain after Justice Sharma released it from her board in May after initiating contempt action against Kejriwal, Sisodia, Pathak and others for their alleged “vilifying“ social media posts against her. When the matter was listed before Justice Jain on May 19, he had asked CBI to inform the AAP functionaries about the change of bench.On Feb 27, the trial court discharged Kejriwal, Sisodia and 21 others in the liquor policy case, ruling that it was wholly unable to survive judicial scrutiny and stood discredited in its entirety.CBI moved high court and, on March 9, Justice Sharma’s bench stayed the trial court’s recommendation on the initiation of departmental action against CBI’s investigating officer in the case.
