CBI contests clean chit to Kavitha, others in Delhi HC

New Delhi: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has filed an appeal in the Delhi High Court, challenging a special court’s order discharging Telangana Jagruthi president K Kavitha, former Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and others in the liquor policy case, officials said on Friday, February 27.

Sources said the federal agency has flagged several points that were ignored and not considered at the framing-of-the-charge level by the special court.

“The CBI has decided to appeal in the high court against the judgment of the trial court immediately since several aspects of the investigation have either been ignored or not considered adequately,” a spokesperson of the agency said in a statement earlier in the day.

The special court on Friday discharged Kavitha, Kejriwal, former Delhi deputy chief minister Sisodia and 20 others in the liquor excise policy case by refusing to take cognisance of the CBI chargesheet against them.

Special Judge Jitendra Singh rapped the CBI for lapses in the investigation, saying there was no cogent evidence against Kejriwal and no prima-facie case against Sisodia and the other accused.

The CBI has been probing alleged corruption in the formulation and execution of the previous Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) government’s now-scrapped excise policy for the national capital.

Court directs departmental inquiry against investigating officer

Special Judge Jitendra Singh also recommended a departmental inquiry against an investigating officer (IO) of the CBI for arraying a public servant as an accused.

The judge flagged the lapses in the investigation and said in his 598-page order, “The duty of the court is not merely to discount the tainted investigative material, but also to recommend initiation of appropriate departmental proceedings against the erring investigating officer (IO) for framing accused 1 (Kuldeep Singh) as an accused.”

While orally pronouncing the substantive portions of the verdict, the judge said, “I am recommending a departmental inquiry…” against the IO, after noting that “there was no material at all” against Singh.

The judge’s order said such an inquiry was needed as there was no evidence against Singh, a former deputy commissioner of excise/IMFL, and that such an action was required “so that accountability is fixed and the institutional credibility of the investigative machinery is preserved”.

Expressing surprise at how, in the absence of incriminating material, public servants, including Singh, were arrayed as accused, and how the sanction for their prosecution was accorded, the judge said, “The manner in which the investigation has been conducted, far from conforming to the discipline of a fair and lawful investigation, discloses a calculated and sustained assault on the foundational tenets of the rule of law.”

He said it is “troubling” that an individual was retained in the column of suspects and simultaneously, presented as a prosecution witness at the stage of filing the chargesheet.

“An investigation must rest on a clear, consistent and principled assessment of the material collected, and not on calculated ambiguity intended to preserve future prosecutorial options,” the judge said.