New Delhi, December 11 (HBTV): The Supreme Court on Wednesday relaxed AAP leader Manish Sisodia's bail conditions in the alleged liquor policy irregularities cases, removing the requirement for him to mark his attendance twice a week before the probe agencies.
However, the top court directed him to attend the trial regularly. A bench of Justices BR Gavai and KV Viswanathan stated that the condition requiring Sisodia to appear twice before the probe agencies was unnecessary, and ordered, "the said condition is deleted."
Senior advocates Abhishek Manu Singhvi and Vivek Jain represented Sisodia in the case. Sisodia had requested a relaxation of his bail conditions, which required him to report to the police station every Monday and Thursday.
Singhvi argued that Sisodia is a respectable individual who had already appeared 60 times before the authorities. He also pointed out that no similar conditions were imposed on other accused in the case and requested a shorter date for the hearing. The court responded that it would decide on the application at the next scheduled hearing.
Earlier, the Supreme Court had granted bail to Sisodia, emphasizing his deep roots in society and the low likelihood of him fleeing. The court also noted that the trial would take a long time, with 493 witnesses, thousands of pages of documents, and over a lakh pages of digitized evidence.
The top court had initially imposed various conditions, including the surrender of Sisodia’s passport to the Special Court, reporting to the Investigating Officer every Monday and Thursday, and refraining from influencing witnesses or tampering with evidence.
Sisodia was arrested in February 2023 by the CBI for alleged irregularities in the formulation and implementation of Delhi's now-scrapped excise policy. The policy was withdrawn amid allegations of foul play by the opposition. Sisodia remains in judicial custody.
According to the CBI, Sisodia played a key role in the criminal conspiracy and was deeply involved in both the formulation and implementation of the policy to achieve the objectives of the conspiracy.
(ANI)