The Delhi Police on Friday told a court that it has booked former Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, among others, for allegedly misusing government funds by installing large billboards in the capital city in 2019, PTI reported.

The police made the statement in a compliance report submitted to Additional Chief Judicial Magistrate Neha Mittal.

On March 11, the judge had ordered a case to be filed against Kejriwal for allegedly misusing public money by putting up hoardings in the city’s Dwarka area. She also directed former Aam Aadmi Party MLA Gulab Singh and former Dwarka councillor Nitika Sharma to be booked in the case.

The magistrate had said that the hoardings were “not only an eyesore and public nuisance”, but also hindered traffic, thus posing a safety challenge to pedestrians and vehicles, The Indian Express reported.

The complaint was filed by an individual Shiv Kumar Saxena, who filed an application under a provision of the Code of Criminal Procedure that gives magistrates the power to order an investigation.

In a status report filed in 2022, the station house officer of the Dwarka police station had said that the complaint was filed in 2019, and at the time when the report was submitted, no billboards were found at the spot. The officer had said that due to this, no cognisable offence was made out, according to The Indian Express.

The court, however, said in its March 11 order that it could not presume that it would be futile to order an investigation in the matter, “especially in this era of scientific and technological advancement”.

The Aam Aadmi Party said that apart from Kejriwal, the original complainant had also named several Bharatiya Janata Party leaders, including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, BJP chief JP Nadda, North East Delhi MP Manoj Tiwari and former MP Parvesh Verma. “It is strange the media is only highlighting the case against Kejriwal,” the party said.