Attempted To Poison The Fountain Of Justice: Delhi High Court Initiates Criminal Contempt Proceedings Against Arvind Kejriwal & Others
Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma rebuked 'social media trials' and orchestrated vilification campaigns; directed suo motu criminal contempt against political leaders for targeting judiciary and judges’ families.
The Delhi High Court has initiated suo motu criminal contempt proceedings against Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh, Saurabh Bhardwaj, Durgesh Pathak, Devesh Vishwakarma and Vinayy Mishra for allegedly orchestrating and amplifying a social media campaign scandalising the judiciary and undermining the administration of justice.
While asserting that its primary duty is to maintain fidelity to the Constitution rather than to satisfy the expectations of powerful litigants who attempt to browbeat the judiciary through orchestrated social media campaigns, the Court referred the high-profile Delhi Excise Policy case to another Bench.
The Bench noted that Kejriwal and others publicly attributed political bias and lack of independence to the Bench, circulated such allegations online, and encouraged non-participation in judicial proceedings. It further clarified that while it would not recuse based on unfounded allegations, judicial propriety now demanded the case be heard by a different Bench to prevent contemnors from projecting themselves as victims of bias.
Dr. Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma observed, “This Court neither seeks sympathy nor demands immunity from criticism. This Court does not require applause; it functions upon the constitutional trust of the people on it and would protect it when deliberate attempts are made to poison the fountain of justice.".
“Let the contemnors not be under any assumption that they succeeded in obtaining a recusal as it is not a recusal but duty after drawing contempt to list it before another Bench, so that complete justice is done. It is not to please the accused but to ensure fidelity to the constitution, it is not due to fear of further humiliation and embarrassment or scandalization of the contemnors but due to being bound to the oath of fair trial even to a contemnor. Let there be no assumption in the minds of the contemnors that they pressurised the Court into not hearing the case and even if they want to project it so, this Court remains unaffected by such actions”, the Bench further observed.
Tushar Mehta, SG, S.V. Raju and D.P. Singh, ASG appeared for the petitioner and Senior Advocates Shadan Farasat and Vikas Pahwa appeared for the respondents.
The proceedings arose from a criminal revision petition related to the Delhi Excise Policy case. After the Court issued notice on March 9, 2026, certain respondents sought the judge’s recusal, alleging bias and political alignment. These applications were dismissed on April 20, 2026. Subsequently, the Court noted that rather than challenging the order in a higher court, the respondents and their political party initiated a coordinated social media campaign on platforms like 'X' and YouTube, reiterating the same rejected allegations to influence public perception.
Following the rejection of recusal, Respondent No. 18 (Arvind Kejriwal) and others publicly declared they would not participate in the proceedings, labeling their absence a "Satyagraha". The Court observed that despite their absence in the courtroom, they remained active on social media, disseminating misleading videos, including an edited clip of a lecture delivered by the judge at Kashi, to portray the Court as biased.
The Court remarking that "a lie spoken a thousand times does not become the truth", and intimidation clothed as criticism is not immune from the law of contempt. It found that the respondents utilised their political reach to "poison the fountain of justice" by targeting the judge's integrity and even dragging her family into the controversy to cause humiliation.
“…when the institution of the judiciary and this Court was put on trial, it became the duty of this Court, at that moment, to stand up for itself and the institution. However, this Court ensured while writing this order that the fear of being unjustifiably defamed further and scandalized does not govern the pen of the Court, and that, the pen, continues to remain governed solely by the rule of law”, the Bench said.
“This Court is cognizant of the fact that a further narrative of having succeeded in getting the case transferred to another Bench will be started by the contemnors in the background of, and considering their past conduct, however, this Court categorically reiterates that the direction to list it before another Bench has nothing to do with the recusal order which stands as it is unchallenged and this Court stands by each word of it. The other dimension that the contemnors must remain aware is that even if they have committed contempt against this Court, this Court has not forgotten its duty, either while drawing the contempt, or while directing the case to be listed before another Bench as the judicial discipline and propriety demands that having drawn contempt proceedings, the case should be heard by another Bench, lest the contemnor accused(s) project themselves as victims of bias. This Court would not grant that opportunity to the proposed contemnors to draw this Court to that controversy”, the Bench further said.
Accordingly, the Registry was directed to register suo motu criminal contempt proceedings against Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia, Durgesh Pathak, Sanjay Singh, and others. To prevent the accused from projecting themselves as "victims of bias", the Court directed that the contempt proceedings be placed before the Chief Justice for assignment to another Bench.
Furthermore, in the interest of judicial propriety, the Court also referred the main revision petition to be heard by a different Bench.
Cause Title: Central Bureau of Investigation v. Kuldeep Singh and Ors. (Neutral Citation: 2026:DHC:4293)
Appearances:
Petitioner: Tushar Mehta, SG, S.V. Raju, D.P. Singh, ASG, with Zoheb Hossain, Spl. Counsel for ED with Manu Mishra, Garima Saxena, Annam Venkatesh, Vivek Gurnani, Panel Counsels, Pranjal Tripathi, Imaan Khera, Bhuvan Kapoor, Digvijay Dam, Madhav Goel, Hitarth Raja and Digvijay Singh, Advocates with J.S. Randhawa-DIG, I.B. Pendhari-SP, Alok Shahi, ASP and Naveen, Sub Inspector for CBI.
Respondents: Naveen Kumar, Tushar Agarwal, Arun Kumar, Abhishek Mahal and Rashi Choudhary, Advocates for R-1; Pradeep Rana and Tushar Rohmetra, Advocates for R-2; Shadan Farasat, Senior Advocate with Harshit Anand and Varisha Sharma, Advocates for R-3; Sumer Singh Boparai and Surya Pratap Singh, Advocates for R-4; Nitesh Rana, Aditi Singh, Zainab Khan, Suyash Pandey, Aditi Singh and Aditya Narayan, Advocates for R-5; Shivendra Dwivedi and Onmichon Ramrar, Advocates for R-6 and R-10; Dhruv Gupta and Anubhav Garg, Advocates for R-7; Adit S. Pujari, Shashwat Sarin, Shaurya Mittal and Dhanya Visweswaran, Advocates for R-9; Abhishek Singh, Talib Mustafa, Vishvendra Tomar, Shreya Singh, Ketan Kumar Roy and Shubh Mathur, Advocates for R-11; Rajat Bhardwaj, Dushyant Chaudhary, Tushar Garg and Vineet Singh, Advocates for R-12 to R-15; Baani Khanna, Robin Singh, Kapil Balwani and Komal Thakkar, Advocates for R-16; Dama Seshadri Naidu, Senior Advocate with Ramesh Allanki, Aruna Gupta and Sahil Sood, Advocates for R-17; Prabhav Ralli, Stuti Gupta, Dev Vrat Arya, Deeya Mittal and Samraat Saxena, Advocates for R-20; Gagan Minocha and Tusharika Mattoo, Advocates for R-21; Harsh Bora and Sahil Ghai, Advocates for R-22; Vikas Pahwa, Senior Advocate with Mayank Jain, Madhur Jain, Arpit Goel and Deepak Jain, Advocates for R-23; Farrukh Khan, Aditya Tyagi, Aryan Dev Pandey, Rashi Khandelwal and Amuldeep, Advocates.