‘Govt yet to sanction plea against clean chits in ex-CS assault case’: Delhi police submission in sessions court

A city court on august 11 this year exonerated Kejriwal, Sisodia and the 9 other MLAs in the case.

The Delhi Police has told a sessions court that the state government is yet to sanction a challenge to the exoneration of chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy Manish Sisodia, and nine Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLAs, in a case filed over the alleged assault on former chief secretary Anshu Prakash during a late-night meeting in 2018.

Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal.

On August 11 this year, a city court exonerated Kejriwal, Sisodia and the nine MLAs in the case, saying there was no “criminal conspiracy” or “unlawful assembly” as alleged by Prakash.

The former chief secretary challenged this decision before the sessions court, contending that the magistrate had drawn erroneous inferences and conclusions without having the benefit of examination of the prosecution witnesses.

Responding to Prakash’s appeal, police said they firmly believed the order giving a clean chit to the accused was a “fit case for filing a revision” petition. In a reply filed before additional sessions judge Geetanjali Goel, police also said they have taken legal advice from experts, including the additional solicitor general.

Police said that, pursuant to such opinions, they wrote two letters on September 17 and October 18 to the Delhi government requesting it to direct the concerned officer/department to file criminal revision before the sessions’ court “…however, the outcome of the same has not been communicated back to us”.

The court took the reply on record, and posted the matter for further hearing on December 7.

In his police complaint in February 2018, Prakash alleged that AAP MLAs assaulted during the course of a midnight meeting called by the CM’s former adviser VK Jain on February 19, 2018, to discuss the release of the party’s advertisements..

On August 11, the city court, while discharging the CM, his deputy and nine AAP MLAs from the case, said that the incident happened suddenly, after some of the MLAs started questioning Prakash over some issues, and in the spur of the moment, two of the MLAs — Amanatullah Khan and Parkash Jarwal — acted without any conspiracy, prior meeting of minds, or pre-meditation.

After the August 11 verdict, Sisodia called the case a “conspiracy” by the Bharatiya Janata Party, a claim the party refuted.

Prakash, through senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, has contended before the sessions court that the trial court failed to appreciate, among other things, that the meeting was called at midnight, which was very unusual as there was no emergency at the time.

Delhi government spokespersons did not respond to requests seeking comment.