New Delhi: The Supreme Court has sought a response from the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on a petition filed by Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) former communication in-charge Vijay Nair seeking bail in the alleged Delhi Excise Policy scam.
Nair, who has been in jail for almost two years, was arrested first by CBI in connection with the excise policy case in September 2022, and has since been in continuous custody.
Nair was earlier granted bail in CBI case
Nair was earlier granted bail in the CBI case but his custody was taken by the ED, which is probing the money laundering aspect of the excise policy case and has not been granted bail in the matter.
The allegation against Nair in the excise policy scam is that he along with others entered into a criminal conspiracy and were involved in irregularities in framing of the excise policy.
Singhvi cited the Manish Sisodia judgment which granted bail to Sisodia.
On Monday, arguing the bail petition before a bench of Justice Hrishkesh Roy and Justice SVN Bhatti, senior advocate Abhishek Manu Singhvi cited the Manish Sisodia judgment which granted bail to Sisodia.
Singhvi said that Sisodia who is a co-accused in the case and was granted bail by the apex court on the ground of long period of incarceration and the possibly that the trial which had not started against the accused was not likely to be concluded any time soon.
Singhvi submitted to the court that Nair is squarely covered by the Sisodia judgment and should be granted bail as eight supplementary charge sheets had been filed in the case, and there were over 350 witnesses and over 16,000 pages of documents which had to be dealt with at the trial stage.
Nair is third high-profile accused in excise policy case seeking bail from the apex court
Vijay Nair is the third high-profile accused in the case along with K kavitha and Delhi Chief Minster Arvind Kejriwal, who have sought bail from the Supreme Court in the Delhi Excise Policy case.
Last week, a bench of Justice BR Gavai and Justice KV Vishwanath had granted bail to Manish Sisodia balancing the right of an accused to speedy trial and long period of incarceration. The court had said that the right to speedy trial and the right to liberty are sacrosanct rights.
