India’s Supreme Court on Friday granted bail to a top opposition politician who was detained last year over a long-running corruption probe.
Manish Sisodia, 52, the deputy chief minister of Delhi, is among several leaders of the opposition Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) who have been accused of receiving kickbacks while handing out liquor permits.
The party’s boss, and the capital’s chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, has been in prison over the same charges since March, save for a brief period when he was released to campaign during national elections.
Both have denied the charges as a “political conspiracy” by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Hindu-nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party.
“Sisodia has deep roots in society and he cannot flee,” said judge Bhushan Ramkrishna Gavai while granting bail.
Gavai said Sisodia had been “deprived” of the “sacrosanct right to a speedy trial”.
Leaders of the AAP said the order was a “big victory” for the party and they expected him to be released from jail later on Friday.
“This a tight slap on Modi’s dictatorial government,” said AAP lawmaker Sanjay Singh, who was also imprisoned for six months in the same case before being granted bail in April.
The Delhi government under Kejriwal is accused of corruption when it liberalised liquor sales in 2021, giving up a lucrative government stake in the sector.
The policy was withdrawn the following year. But a multi-agency probe mounted by the Modi government into the alleged corrupt allocation of licences continues to haunt Kejriwal and his aides.
