SC defers till Monday Chidambaram plea for protection against arrest

New Delhi: In a setback to the Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram, the Supreme Court on Friday deferred the hearing of Chidambaram's plea challenging the Delhi High Court order in CBI case until Monday.

This essentially means that the Supreme Court refused to give relief to former union minister and he will continue to stay under arrest.

The top court, however, granted him protection from arrest in Enforcement Directorate case till Monday. This is not a good news for Chidambaram as he is already in custody of CBI. 

Chidambaram, who was arrested by the CBI on Wednesday in the INX media case, had approached the top court against the high court's August 20 verdict.

After the court's decision to defer the hearing, Chidambaram's close friend and senior lawyer Kapil Sibal alleged that a fair chance was not given to them. Sibal also complained of the way in which the plea against Delhi High Court verdict was not heard despite moving to the Supreme Court in time.

''After the arguments were over, Solicitor General gave a note to Justice Gaur, the High Court judge. We were not given chance to reply on that,'' Sibal said.

Rebutting Sibal's claim, Solicitor general Tushar Mehta, representing the CBI, said: ''Don't make false statements, I didn’t give it after the arguments were over.''

A Delhi court on Thursday allowed CBI the four-day custody of Chidambaram.

The Congress leader was arrested after he failed to get protection on Wednesday from the Supreme Court which decided to hear on Friday his plea seeking stay of the high court order.

His plea would be heard in the apex court by a bench comprising Justices R Banumathi and AS Bopanna.

On Wednesday, Registrar (Judicial) of the apex court had informed Chidambaram's lawyers that Chief Justice of India (CJI) Ranjan Gogoi has listed the matter for hearing on Friday.

Chidambaram, who was home minister and finance minister in the UPA government from 2004-2014, had sought a stay on the Delhi High Court's August 20 judgement which had dismissed his anticipatory bail plea, paving the way for his arrest in cases related to the INX Media scam.

The cases have been lodged by the CBI and the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

Repeated attempts were made by his lawyers Wednesday for seeking urgent hearing on Chidambaram's plea the same day itself, but the CJI decided that the case will be heard on Friday.

Solicitor General Tushar Mehta had opposed the plea of Chidambaram for hearing the matter on oral mentioning saying that the papers are not with him. Chidambaram had suffered a major setback on August 20 when the high court dismissed his anticipatory bail in the INX Media case describing him as the "kingpin", and paved the way for the investigating agencies, CBI and ED, to arrest him.