Won't Proceed With Trial Of Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira In NDPS Case : State Of Punjab Tells Supreme Court

Accordingly, the bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and Pankaj Mithal recorded in their order:

“Learned Senior Counsel Mr. Siddharth Dave for the respondent State states on instruction that the respondent shall not proceed further with the proceedings of the Trial court till the next date....List after four weeks. In the meantime, the pleadings may be completed.…”

Khaira had filed an appeal against the Punjab & Haryana High Court's order that refused to quash his arrest order in the 2015 International Drugs trade case.

Today, the Court specifically asked the State to either make a statement that the trial would not commence or the Court would put a stay on the same. Following this, Senior Advocate PS Patwalia, representing Khaira, told the Court that the matter is listed today before the trial court. Pursuant to this, Dave acceded and said that the State will get the matter adjourned.

The genesis of this controversy is in the information report (FIR) that was lodged (in 2015) against 11 persons invoking various provisions of the Narcotics and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985, the Arms Act, 1959, and the Information Technology Act, 2000.

This resulted in a 2017 ruling by a sessions court convicting nine of the accused and acquitting two. On the same day when this judgment was delivered, the trial court summoned five new people for inquiry in this case, including Khaira. After several rounds of litigation, Khaira, who was then the opposition leader in the Punjab legislative assembly, reached the Supreme Court in an appeal against the summons. A constitution bench in December 2022 finally ruled that Section 319 CrPC powers must be invoked before the pronouncement of the order of sentence in cases of conviction or before the order of acquittal in cases of acquittal.

Despite this verdict, Khaira was arrested on September 28, 2023, in connection with the massive heroin trade case. After the initial arrest of other accused persons, he was added to additional prosecution proceedings for allegedly having connections with one of the accused. Khaira, however, maintained that his arrest was politically motivated, given his departure from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), which is now the ruling party in Punjab.

Pertinently, the Punjab & Haryana High Court had granted him bail, and the same was not interfered with by the Apex Court.

Case Title: SUKHPAL SINGH KHAIRA v. STATE OF PUNJAB AND ORS., SLP(Crl) No. 2100/2024