Delhi court drops charges against CM Arvind Kejriwal, Dy CM Manish Sisodia, 9 other MLAs in manhandling case

A city court on Wednesday discharged Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and nine other MLAs in connection with a case of manhandling of former chief secretary Anshu Prakash.

However, the court has ordered for framing of charges against two Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Amantullah and Prakash Jarwal in the same case.

The Delhi Police had chargesheeted Kejriwal, Sisodia, Amanatullah Khan, Prakash Jarwal, Nitin Tyagi, Rituraj Govind, Sanjeev Jha, Ajay Dutt, Rajesh Rishi, Rajesh Gupta, Madan Lal, Parveen Kumar and Dinesh Mohania under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for voluntarily causing hurt and obstructing a public servant to deter him/her from doing duty, wrongful confinement and assault.

The Delhi Police had accused them of insult with intent to provoke breach of peace, criminal intimidation, criminal conspiracy, punishment of abetment and unlawful assembly among others.

The AAP called it a "midnight conspiracy to defame the Delhi Chief Minister, Deputy Chief Minister and other MLAs in a false and laughable case".

The Delhi Chief Secretary had alleged that he was beaten up by AAP MLAs in the presence of Kejriwal at the Chief Minister's residence where he had been called for a late-night meeting.

The case was filed the next morning and Amanatullah Khan and Prakash Jarwal were arrested and sent to judicial custody. Later, they were released on bail.