Delhi Excise Policy: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) arrested Manish Sisodia, Deputy Chief Minister of the Union Territory of Delhi on 26 February in connection with the Delhi Excise Policy scam. The action was taken after almost eight hours of questioning of Manish Sisodia in connection with alleged corruption in the formulation and implementation of the now canceled liquor policy for the year 2021-22. The CBI has claimed that whatever answers Sisodia gave during the interrogation were not found satisfactory. Meanwhile, the Aam Aadmi Party said on Twitter that it was a ‘black day for democracy’. Although many arrests have been made in the case before Sisodia.
CBI charge sheet
On November 25, 2022, the CBI filed the first charge sheet against the seven accused. In which two arrested businessmen were involved in the case. It also includes the names of the head of a news channel, a liquor baron from Hyderabad, a liquor distributor from Delhi and two officials of the Excise Department. The CBI named nine businessmen and two companies, including the then Excise Commissioner Arawa Gopi Krishna, Assistant Excise Commissioner Pankaj Bhatnagar, the then Deputy Excise Commissioner Anand Kumar Tiwari, among others. Amit Arora, Dinesh Arora and Arjun Pandey, directors of Buddy Retail Pvt Ltd in Gurgaon, are ‘close associates’ of Sisodia and were involved in managing and diverting undue windfall profits collected from liquor licensees, according to the CBI, reported news agency PTI. Were.
These people have been booked under section 120-B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC and the provision of bribery under the Prevention of Corruption Act.
Enforcement Directorate action
Earlier on February 25, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) arrested Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) communication in-charge Vijay Nair, liquor baron Sameer Mahandru, his wife and company Indospirit Group, businessmen Dinesh Arora, Arun Pillai for laundering Rs 76.54 crore. The property was attached. In its statement, the ED has issued an attachment order under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) to freeze the assets.
ED arrested these accused
The accused arrested by the ED in the Delhi Excise Policy scam case are Vijay Nair, Sameer Mahandru, Amit Arora, Benoy Babu, General Manager of leading French liquor company Pernod Ricard, P Sarath Chandra Reddy, whole time director and promoter of Aurobindo Pharma. And Hyderabad’s businessman is Abhishek Boinapalli.