Arvind Kejriwal, the chief minister of India's national capital territory of Delhi, has been sent to custody until March 28 after he was arrested for alleged corruption in the city's liquor policy.
Kejriwal appeared before a local court on Friday, which sent him to the Enforcement Directorate's (ED) custody.
The 55-year-old whose Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) also runs Punjab state, was arrested on Thursday night by the financial crime-fighting agency ED for alleged corruption in awarding liquor licences.
His party has dismissed the allegations as "a desperate attempt to malign the image" of Kejriwal.
The arrest potentially takes one of the opposition alliance's biggest campaigners out of action ahead of the general elections to be held from April to June, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is widely expected to win a rare third straight term.
Kejriwal is a former senior tax official who won the Ramon Magsaysay Award, often called Asia's Nobel Prize, in 2006 for leading a right-to-information movement and helping the poor fight corruption.
He earlier ignored multiple summons from the ED that investigates money laundering. Three of his senior party colleagues are already in jail waiting trial in the liquor case.
Britain working with allies to support shipping through Strait of Hormuz
Five Iranian women's soccer players granted humanitarian visas in Australia
Almost 700,000 displaced after Israeli strikes on Lebanon, UN agencies say
Iran fighting back but not stronger than U.S. thought, top U.S. general says
British warship HMS Dragon departs for Eastern Mediterranean
One dead, several injured in Iranian attack on Manama building
Russian drones injure 20 in Ukraine's Kharkiv, Dnipro
Trump says war could be over soon, as Iran rallies behind new leader
