Supreme Court extends interim medical bail granted to AAP's Satyendar Jain till January 8

The Supreme Court on Thursday ordered that the interim medical bail granted earlier this year to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and former Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain be extended till January 8, 2024 [Satyendar Kumar Jain v Directorate of Enforcement]..A bench of Justices Bela M Trivedi and Satish Chandra Sharma passed the order after examining the medical documents of Jain."Having regard to the submissions made and the documents on record and without expressing any opinion on merits we are inclined to extend the interim bail which was granted on May 2023 and extended till this date. List this case on January 8, 2024. Interim protection extended till January 8, 2024," the Court ordered.The Supreme Court had first granted Jail medical bail on May 26 this year and the same had since been extended till date. .The bench was hearing the bail plea of the former Delhi Health Minister in the money-laundering case against him.Jain was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in May 2022 and he remained in jail for a year before procuring interim bail on medical grounds. .The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) had initially registered a case against Jain under Sections 13(2) (criminal misconduct by public servant) read with 13(e) (disproportionate assets) of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988.The case was registered on the allegation that Jain had acquired movable properties in the name of various persons between 2015 and 2017 which he could not satisfactorily account for.Later, the ED also alleged that several companies beneficially owned and controlled by him received accommodation entries amounting to ₹4.81 crore from shell companies against cash transferred to Kolkata-based entry operators through a hawala route.He was later arrested.The Delhi High Court denied bail to him in April 2023 while opining that Jain was an influential person and cannot be said to have satisfied the twin conditions for bail under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).Before that, a trial court had rejected his bail plea on November 17, 2022.