Supreme Court refuses to release Hemant Soren on interim bail for election campaigning

New Delhi: The Supreme Court has refused to release former Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren on interim bail to participate in the ongoing Lok Sabha elections.

Rejecting Soren’s plea for interim bail, the bench of Justice Dipankar Datta and Justice SN Sharma on Wednesday took strong exception to Soren pursuing parallel proceedings one in the Special PMLA court seeking regular bail and another in Supreme Court seeking release on interim bail and withholding the fact from the apex court and refused to hear the case any further on merits.

The court also was peeved with the fact that Soren in his petition for interim bail had not disclosed to the Supreme court that that special PMLA court in Ranchi had taken cognizance of offence against Soren.

Soren had a week back approached the Supreme Court seeking interim bail and had relied on Arvind Kejriwal order. The Supreme Court has earlier this month released Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on interim bail for campaigning in the Lok Sabha polls till June 1.

On Tuesday, the ED had opposed the release of Soren saying that if he is released there was a strong likely hood that he would interfere with investigations and also tamper with evidence and influence the witnesses.

Moreover, the ED had also taken the stand that there was not similarity between Kejriwal and Soren case as in Soren’s case, the special court has taken cognizance of the charges against him. Soren’s bail application has also been rejected by the trial court and unlike Kejriwal, Soren was not arrested few days before the declaration of the 18th Lok Sabha elections.

Hemant Soren, former CM of Jharkhand was arrested by the ED on January 31 this year for his involvement in a land scam case in the state capital and had moved Supreme court seeking permission to participate in the on going Lok Sabha polls to campaign for his party the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM).

Besides, Soren had also challenged the legality of his arrest by ED in the land grabbing case.