The Supreme Court on Friday granted bail to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and former Delhi minister Manish Sisodia in both the ED and Manish Sisodia in both the ED and CBI cases filed in connection with the alleged excise policy scam. Noting that Sisodia was in prison for 17 months, a bench of Justices BR Gavai and KV Viswanathan said the AAP leader was deprived of the right to speedy trial by the trial court and High Court. “We find that on account of a long incarceration running around 17 months and trial having not been commenced, the appellant (Sisodia) has been deprived of the right to speedy trial,” the court said. Sisodia was arrested by the CBI on February 2023 and a month later by the ED in a money laundering case.
Emphasising that the right to a speedy trial was sacrosanct, the top court said the trial court and the High Court ought to have given due weight to this. Previously, the trial court and the Delhi High Court denied bail to Sisodia. “Courts have forgotten that bail ought not to be withheld as punishment. The principle is that bail is the rule and jail is an exception. In this case, 493 witnesses have been named. There is not the remotest possibility that the trial will conclude in the recent future,” the Supreme Court said. The two-judge bench also said that the triple test (flight risk, influencing witnesses, tampering with evidence) for granting bail to Sisodia under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) would not apply to the plea since it is based on delay in trial.
