The Supreme Court has refused to grant interim bail to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA from Punjab Jaswant Singh Gajjanmajra. Jaswant Singh had sought interim release from jail to campaign in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections. He has been in custody for 6 months in a fraud case of Rs 40 crore.
The vacation bench of Justice Sanjay Karol and Justice Arvind Kumar refused to grant interim bail through an ex parte order (order without hearing the other side). In this, a response was sought from the Central Government and Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Jaswant Singh's petition challenging his arrest by the central agency as well as his application for interim bail. This reply will have to be filed within a week.
Jaswant Singh has been behind bars for more than 6 months in the money laundering case being investigated by ED. The Punjab and Haryana High Court had previously refused to quash his arrest and remand on May 24. Following this, an immediate appeal was made in the Supreme Court.
Jaswant Singh is the MLA from Amargarh assembly constituency in Malerkotla. He is accused of defrauding banks to the tune of Rs 40 crore by misusing the loans given to his company.
Accused of wrongful arrest, sought bail
Jaswant Singh has alleged that the manner in which he was arrested is a violation of Section 19 of the PMLA. Advocate Vikram Chowdhary and Advocate Nikhil Jain appeared before the Apex court on behalf of Jaswant Singh.