Justice Sudhir Kumar Jain said that the trial court did not apply its mind to the material submitted by the ED and did not give adequate opportunity to the ED to argue its case.
The Court passed the order on a plea by ED seeking stay of the trial court order passed on June 20 granting bail to Kejriwal.
“Observation by trial court that voluminous material cannot be considered is totally unjustified and it shows that the trial court has not applied its mind to the material. The vacation court ought to give adequate opportunity to ED to argue bail application,” the High Court said.
The High Court further said that the trial court did not adequately address the argument on twin conditions for bail under Section 45 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
“There was a strong argument that the twin condition of Section 45 PMLA was not deliberated by the vacation judge. This court is of the opinion that Section 45 PMLA has not been properly discussed by the trial court,” the High Court stated.
Further, the High Court said that the finding of the trial court that there was malafides on ED’s part was incorrect since the High Court itself had in earlier order rejected such a claim by Kejriwal.
“Most important, the ASG referred to para 27 of the trial court order where the judge talks about mala fide by the ED. But this court is of the opinion that a coordinate bench of this court has said there was no mala fide on the part of the ED. Trial court should not have given any finding which is opposite to the finding of the High Court,” the single-judge underlined.
Source: Barandbench
