Delhi’s Rouse Avenue Court Extends Manish Sisodia’s ED Custody Till March 22

Delhi’s Rouse Avenue Court on Friday extended the Enforcement Directorate (ED) custody of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Manish Sisodia till March 22, who was arrested in a money laundering case related to the alleged Delhi excise policy case.

After hearing ED counsel Zoheb Hossain and Senior Advocates Mohit Mathur and Siddharth Aggarwal, who appeared for Sisodia, Special Judge MK Nagpal pronounced the decision. The judge asked the agency to bring Sisodia before it again on March 22.

This comes hours after the ED sought a seven-day extension for former Delhi deputy CM. Sisodia, who was arrested by the financial inquiry agency on March 9 following two days of questioning, is being held in Delhi’s Tihar jail after being arrested in the same case by the CBI last month.

The court permitted Sisodia to sign cheques for his family’s expenses and his wife’s medical bills of Rs 40,000 and Rs 45,000, respectively, after extending his custody.

According to the financial investigation agency, Manish Sisodia would be confronted with witnesses in the case.

The ED informed the Court that it had obtained Sisodia’s cloud data, which included 1.23 lakh email dumps, and that it required time to conduct investigations on the data forensically. The ED said that Sisodia discarded away his previous phone, which had information on the now-scrapped Delhi liquor case.

Sisodia’s lawyer opposed the ED’s plea for an extension of remand, claiming that no word had been received from the agency on the proceeds of the crime.

This comes a day after the CBI lodged a fresh case against imprisoned former deputy chief minister, Manish Sisodia, for suspected misuse of his official position and utilising the city government’s Feedback Unit for “political snooping”.

Meanwhile, the Delhi government has assigned Sisodia’s official house to Atishi, who was given control of the ministry of education, public works, culture, and tourism following Sisodia’s arrest.