Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday withdrew his petition from the Supreme Court that challenged his arrest by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with the Delhi Excise Policy case.
Though a Special Bench of Justice Sanjiv Khanna, Justice MM Sundresh and Justice Bela M Trivedi was to take up the plea later in the day,
Appearing for Kejriwal, Senior Advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi mentioned the matter before Justice Sanjiv Khanna, while he was sitting with Justice Dipankar Datta.
He said Kejriwal was withdrawing the plea because the ED remand was clashing with the same. He said the petitioner would first fight the remand and then come back to the Apex Court.
The Senior Counsel apprised the Bench that he would give a letter to the Registry. He requested the Apex Court to kindly tell the same to the Court master as well.
The Bench allowed him to give a letter to the Registry.
Earlier in the day, a Bench of Justice Khanna, Justice Sundresh and Justice Trivedi had refused to consider the bail plea filed by Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) leader K Kavitha, who was also arrested by ED in the same case, under Article 32.
Stating that statutory remedies cannot be bypassed just because a politician was involved, the bench asked Kavitha to approach the trial court for bail. In February, the same bench had refused to entertain Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren’s plea against his arrest by the ED asking him to approach the High Court.
The matter was initially mentioned before Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud this morning, when the CJI asked the counsels to approach the Special Bench assembled in Court 2.