Breather : Supreme Court Upholds Bail To Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren ; ED Plea Rejected

In a relief to Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren, the Supreme Court has dismissed the Enforcement Directorate’s plea challenging a high court order granting him bail in a money laundering case linked to an alleged land scam.

The apex court said the Jharkhand high court’s June 28 order granting bail to Soren was a “very well reasoned judgement”.

“We are not inclined to interfere with the impugned order,” a bench of Justices BR Gavai and KV Viswanathan said in a report by PTI.

However, the top court said that since the observations made by the high court were with regard to consideration for granting bail, the same would not influence the trial judge, either at the stage of trial or any other proceedings.

“We find a very well reasoned judgement has been rendered by the single judge (of the high court),” the bench said, adding, “We don’t want to observe anything more… if we observe, you (ED) might be in difficulty.” Soren, the executive president of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha, had resigned as chief minister shortly before the ED arrested him on January 31 in the case.

After coming out of jail on bail in the case, he returned as the chief minister of Jharkhand on July 4.