Former Maharashtra minister Anil Deshmukh may walk out of jail on Wed

Mumbai, Dec 27 (IANS) The Bombay High Court on Tuesday refused a CBI plea to extend the stay on its order granting bail to former Maharashtra Home Minister and Nationalist Congress Party leader Anil Deshmukh (73), paving the way for his release on Wednesday.

A single-judge vacation bench of Justice Santosh Chapalgaonkar declined to entertain CBI's plea against the backdrop of the regular court's previous order that no plea for further extension will be entertained, thus paving the way for Deshmukh to walk out of jail on Wednesday, said his lawyer Aniket Nikam.

On December 12, Justice M.S. Karnik, while staying the bail order for 10 days, had also made it clear that no further request for extension would be entertained under any circumstances.

The CBI had challenged the bail order in the Supreme Court, but could not get a hearing as the apex court is closed for vacation till January 2, after which the central agency again approached the high court on Tuesday.

CBI's counsel Shreeram Shirsat said that a special leave petition was already filed in the SC but they were not able to mention it there.

Lawyers Nikam and Inderpal Singh argued that the CBI was attempting to 'overreach' the high court's earlier order, and that it failed to make out any urgency in the SC where the matter is sub-judice.

Now, Deshmukh's bail order of December 12 will become effective from Wednesday when he is expected to be set free - after remaining in custody since November 2, 2021 when he was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Earlier, the high court had granted him bail in November 2022 in a money-laundering case filed by the ED, which the Supreme Court had declined to set aside.

The CBI had lodged its own separate case against Deshmukh in April 2022 under various offences of corruption and Indian Penal Code on various charges of misusing his office when he was the Maharashtra Home Minister.

Challenging the December 12 bail order in the SC, the CBI contended, among other things, that the high court had gravely erred in granting bail to Deshmukh, failing to consider its consequences as the probe is still underway.