Former Amnesty India chief Aakar Patel moved a contempt petition against CBI today after he was stopped from flying to the US despite a court' order setting aside the lookout circular against him.
In his petition, he said, “That it is far from believable that an agency like CBI which is supposed to be available twenty four seven, being a law enforcement agency conveniently chose to sleep on the order of the Hon'ble Court despite the word "immediately" used by the Hon'ble Court and being aware of the fact that the applicant was travelling at night on 07.04.2022."
The non-availability of the investigating officer despite the order "leaves no manner of doubt that Respondent agency deliberately and wilfully decided to not give effect to the order dated 07.04.2022 passed by this Hon'ble Court,” the plea said.
Mr Patel stressed that he had informed the CBI that he had to leave at 11 pm on Thursday. A CBI source has said the special court's order came around 4.30 pm yesterday and that the agency had been given 24 hours to comply with it.
Earlier in the day, CBI sources had told NDTV that they will be challenging the special court's order giving the relief to Mr Patel. The central probe agency will file an appeal against the CBI court order this morning, the source added.
A lookout circular is an alert issued by law enforcement agencies to authorities in airports and seaports to stop any wanted person from leaving the country.
Mr Patel tweeted last evening that despite the court's order granting him relief, he was stopped at Bengaluru airport from flying out. "Have been stopped at immigration again. cbi has not taken me off their look out circular," read his post that came shortly after the special court ordered the CBI to "immediately" drop the airport alert against him.
A second tweet read, "immigration at bangalore airport says nobody at cbi answering their calls". Mr Patel had also said that he would move the court again.
Mr Patel had approached the court after he was stopped from flying to the US from the Bengaluru airport. The court ordered that the investigating agency give him a written apology in view of the "mental harassment".
Mr Patel had told the court that he was apparently on an "exit control list" because of the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) case against Amnesty International. This happened even after he got his passport back and the go ahead from a court specifically for a trip to the US between March 1 and May 30.
The agency, however, said the clearance for travel came from a Gujarat court in a case registered by the Gujarat police. The airport alert, the agency said, was in connection with a CBI case against Amnesty International India and others for alleged violations linked to foreign funding.
The Special Court in Delhi strongly criticised the agency, saying a lookout circular should not have been issued "merely on the basis of apprehensions arising out of whims and fancies of the investigating agency".
"This act of the investigating agency has caused monetary loss of around Rs.3.8 lakh to the applicant/accused as he has missed his flight," the court said.
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