HC allows Kejriwal to call 2 documents, refuses to permit DDCA minutes

New Delhi: The Delhi High Court on Monday allowed Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s plea calling for two DDCA documents in connection with a defamation suit filed against him by Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

Referring to one of Jaitley’s cross-examination sessions on Kejriwal’s behalf, the court said questions put to the Union minister were not relevant to the case and the questioners should have restrained themselves from putting them. The court said it was not clear in which direction the cross examination was proceeding.

Justice Manmohan also made it clear that the court was allowing Kejriwal’s plea to summon only two documents of February 10, 2003 and April 6, 2003, with which Jaitley can be confronted during his cross-examination.

Jaitley’s cross-examination in the suit is going on before a joint registrar who has directed Kejriwal to wind up the cross examination on February 12 itself. The high court, however, declined Kejriwal’s plea to summon the entire minutes of meetings of the cricket body between 1999 and 2013, when Jaitley was president of the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA).

The court said it cannot understand how the minutes of were relevant to this defamation suit against Kejriwal. Moreover, no grounds were given by the chief minister for summoning the details. Regarding the documents which have been allowed to be summoned, the court asked Kejriwal to file a proper application in two days. The high court’s order came on Kejriwal’s appeal challenging the joint registrar’s order dismissing his plea to summon the minutes of meeting of DDCA and the other two documents.

The instant appeal has been moved by the chief minister in the Rs 10 crore defamation case filed by Jaitley against him and five other Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leaders – Raghav Chadha, Kumar Vishwas, Ashutosh, Sanjay Singh and Deepak Bajpai – for accusing the BJP leader of corruption when he was DDCA president.