The Delhi High Court today reserved its judgment on whether it should hear the criminal writ petition moved by Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s close aide Bibhav Kumar against his arrest in the case alleging that he had assaulted Rajya Sabha MP Swati Maliwal.
A single judge bench of Justice Swarna Kanta Sharma heard preliminary arguments on the aspect after the Delhi Police said Bibhav Kumar has an alternative remedy of moving a revision plea against the Magistrate’s order who had rejected the petition challenging his arrest.
Earlier on Friday, Justice Navin Chawla transferred the matter to Justice Sharma’s court, which is the roster bench for cases involving MPs and MLAs. Bibhav Kumar, who is accused of having assaulted the Rajya Sabha MP Swati Maliwal at Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s official residence, has moved the High Court to declare his arrest illegal and also sought compensation for the same.
Kumar has urged the High Court to declare that his arrest was in violation of the guidelines laid down by the apex court in the Arnesh Kumar judgment. Appearing for the Delhi Police, Senior Advocate Sanjay Jain, opposed the plea, argued that Kumar’s plea is not maintainable as the magistrate court had disposed of a similar plea. He added that Kumar should have approached the Sessions Court against the order.
The Senior Advocate argued that similar non-compliance of Section 41A CrPC was taken by them, and it was decided by the order of May 20 by the magistrate court. He noted that alternate remedy is available to them to file a revision petition, and if notice is issued on the writ petition, the counsel will be prejudiced at many levels.
Senior Advocate N Hariharan, who appeared for Bibhav Kumar countered the arguments, mentioning that their main prayer is to declare the arrest illegal as there has been violation of his Article 21 of the Constitution of India. He added that the Court was also told that Kumar had himself written to the Investigating Officer (IO) that he is ready to join the investigation and yet he was arrested. He was denied bail by Delhi’s Tis Hazari Court on May 27.
Meanwhile, the Delhi High Court today also rejected a public interest litigation (PIL) petition seeking action against media houses for revealing the identity of AAP Rajya Sabha Member of Parliament (MP) Swati Maliwal in connection with the alleged assault on her by Arvind Kejriwal’s aide Bibhav Kumar.
A Division Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Manmohan and Justice Manmeet Pritam Singh Arora said that the plea had political colour behind it and that Maliwal herself had gone to the media and talked about the case.