'Peda Banaunga, Pelunga': Pawan Khera Rakes Up Himanta Biswa Sarma's Remarks In SC During Anticipatory Bail Hearing

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved its judgment on a plea filed by Congress leader Pawan Khera seeking anticipatory bail in a defamation case filed by Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma’s wife, Riniki Bhuyan Sarma.

A bench comprising Justice JK Maheshwari and Justice Atul Chandurkar heard Khera’s plea challenging the Gauhati High Court’s order, which rejected the Congress leader’s anticipatory bail application, reported India Today.

Senior advocate and Rajya Sabha MP Abhishek Manu Singhvi represented Khera in the top court. He argued that his client faces a “credible apprehension of arrest.”

“My client faces arrest... lot of apprehension... he (Himanta Biswa Sarma) keeps on saying peda banaunga, pelunga,” Singhvi said, referring to statements reportedly made by Sarma. Singhvi referred to the case as "an unprecedented case."

Singhvi said he cannot read some of Sarma’s statements in open court because they contain "unprintable" words.

He argued that Sarma has threatened that Khera will spend the rest of his life in an Assam jail. "Dr Ambedkar would turn in his grave if he had imagined that a Constitutional office holder will speak like a Constitutional cowboy or a Constitutional Rambo," Singhvi said, as quoted by Live Law.

“Let me assume that I will be convicted ultimately. Why is it necessary to arrest me? The necessity is apparently only arising from the angst reflected in the Constitutional cowboy's various statements, and that is not the law,” Singhvi said, questioning the need for custodial interrogation.

The case relates to allegations made by Khera in a press conference claiming that CM Sarma’s wife, Riniki Bhuyan Sarma, possessed multiple foreign passports, undeclared luxury properties in Dubai, and shell companies in the United States.

Earlier, rejecting Khera’s anticipatory bail plea, the Gauhati High Court had observed that custodial interrogation was necessary to identify the sources who allegedly provided him with “false documents”.

“If I cannot seek anticipatory bail in this situation, then the very purpose of anticipatory bail is gone,” he said in the SC criticising the issuance of a non-bailable warrant.