New Delhi: Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma will continue hearing the CBI’s challenge to the discharge of former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in the excise policy case, after the Delhi High Court took on record Kejriwal’s recusal plea and dismissed the grounds raised.
The judge listed the matter for hearing on April 13, while Solicitor General Tushar Mehta, appearing for the CBI, termed the recusal application “frivolous, vexatious and contemptuous”. “Some people in this country make a career of making allegations… You go on a public platform and allege anything against anyone,” he told the court.
Kejriwal, who appeared in person, told Justice Sharma he would argue the plea himself. “I will exercise my legal rights. Right now, I have not issued vakalatnama to anyone,” he said, after submitting that a litigant appearing in person cannot e-file and needs a lawyer to file it.
The AAP convenor sought recusal claiming a “grave, bona fide, and reasonable apprehension” that the hearing would not be impartial, citing the judge’s past orders denying relief to him and her attendance at a legal seminar organised by the Akhil Bharatiya Adhivakta Parishad.
The CBI countered that several Supreme Court and High Court judges have attended functions by the RSS-affiliated body, and said attending a legal seminar “does not demonstrate any ideological association.”
“If anyone else wants to file the application, please do it so that I can decide it once and for all,” Justice Sharma remarked.
The court has since sought the CBI’s reply and said other discharged accused, including Manish Sisodia and Durgesh Pathak, may also move similar pleas. Earlier, Chief Justice D K Upadhyaya had declined to transfer the case, stating that a call for recusal rests with the judge concerned.
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