Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy and others were on Monday asked by a court in New Delhi to respond to a plea filed by former chief secretary Anshu Prakash challenging their discharge in a case of alleged assault on him in 2018.
Special Judge Geetanjali Goel issued notice to Mr Kejriwal, Deputy CM Manish Sisodia and 9 others on the plea challenging an order that discharged the politicians on August 11.
The criminal case relates to the alleged assault on Anshu Prakash during a meeting at Mr Kejriwal's official residence on February 19, 2018.
The court directed the Mr Kejriwal, Mr Sisodia and other AAP MLAs -- Rajesh Rishi, Nitin Tyagi, Praveen Kumar, Ajay Dutt, Sanjeev Jha, Rituraj Govind, Rajesh Gupta, Madan Lal, and Dinesh Mohania -- to file their replies by November 23, when the court will further hear the matter.
Besides, the court also issued notice to AAP MLAs Amantullah Khan and Prakash Jarwal against whom the court had ordered framing of the charges.
Senior advocate Sidharth Luthra and advocate Kumar Vaibhav, appearing for Anshu Prakash, urged the judge to set aside the order passed by the magisterial court and direct it to frame the charges against all the accused in the case.
The plea stated that the magisterial court erred in discharging Mr Kejriwal and others in its August order.
Anshu Prakash also sought the framing of additional charges including 506 (criminal intimidation) of IPC against Khan and Jarwal.
“Trial court has conducted a fishing and roving enquiry into the allegations in the charge sheet, and has drawn erroneous inferences and conclusions without having the benefit of examination of the prosecution witnesses. Many such inferences and findings are also contrary to the record,” the petition said.
The magisterial court had discharged Mr Kejriwal, saying his conduct clearly was not in consonance with the allegations levelled against him.
Regarding Mr Khan and Mr Jarwal, the court had said that prima facie case was made out against them to proceed further with the trial after framing of charges against them.
Mr Kejriwal, Mr Sisodia and nine other AAP MLAs were granted bail in October 2018.
Amanatullah Khan and Prakash Jarwal were granted bail earlier by the high court.
The alleged assault had triggered a bitter tussle between the Delhi government and its bureaucrats.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
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