The Supreme Court on Thursday asked Lipika Mitra, the estranged wife of Aam Aadmi Party lawmaker and former Delhi law minister Somnath Bharti, whether she was inclined to join mediation to resolve all the issues with her husband.
The apex court bench headed by Chief Justice H.L. Dattu issued notice, asking her to respond by Monday as it fixed the next date of hearing at 10.30 a.m. on 5 October.
A Delhi court on Wednesday fixed 15 October for hearing Somnath Bharti’s plea seeking registration of a first information report pertaining to a probe into his midnight raid in Khirki Extension area in January 2014.
Bharti, who had surrendered to police on Monday evening, had been named in an FIR filed at Dwarka North police station in west Delhi following a 10 June complaint by his wife who said he had been abusing her since their marriage in 2010.
Somnath last month filed the application challenging a magisterial court order that dismissed his plea for registration of an FIR against unidentified police officials under charges dealing with framing of incorrect record and making false charge of offence with intent to injure, among other things.
Bharti and others were charge-sheeted on 29 September last year under 16 sections of the Indian Penal Code, including those pertaining to outraging the modesty of women. In the charge sheet of over 100 pages, police cited around 41 prosecution witnesses, including nine African women, to buttress the charges.
