ED calls in Arvind Kejriwal's aide, AAP MLA in liquor excise policy case

ED questioned Kejriwal's PA and AAP MLA in money laundering probe related to Delhi excise policy irregularities. AAP alleges BJP-ED conspiracy.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) questioned Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s personal assistant Bibhav Kumar and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Durgesh Pathak on Monday in investigation of the money laundering aspects of the alleged irregularities in the Delhi excise policy 2021-22, officers said.

AAP leader Durgesh Pathak at ED office on Monday. (PTI)

The team is trying to connect bribes allegedly paid by the so-called “South Group” to AAP leaders, according to officials familiar with the development who spoke on condition of anonymity.

Read here: ‘Lack of seriousness’: Delhi LG slams ministers for not attending meeting. AAP responds

ED needed clarifications on documents from Kumar and Kejriwal’s engagements, while Pathak’s name surfaced in statements related to cash payments made during AAP’s Goa assembly election campaign, an officer said.

The questioning comes days after Delhi minister Atishi said that Pathak was among four AAP leaders who would be arrested by ED after Kejriwal, who was arrested in the case last month and is currently in Tihar prison.

Kejriwal’s arrest — one of the first of a sitting chief minister’s in the country — is the latest and most crucial development in a long, bitter political battle between his AAP and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) .

The party on Monday launched its Lok Sabha campaign with Kejriwal’s arrest as the central theme, urging voters to throw out the BJP government which it accuses of musing federal agencies to weaken its rivals ahead of the Lok Sabha elections due to begin next week.

Senior AAP leaders called the summonses a conspiracy to curtail the party’s campaigns.

Officials in the chief minister’s office did not respond to requests seeking comment.

Kumar was questioned for around six hours and Pathak for five. Neither of them have been named as an accused in the excise case.

ED’s charge sheet has alleged that Kumar, former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, and 34 others “destroyed, used or changed” 170 phones to conceal evidence of “kickbacks” worth thousands of crores of rupees in the alleged scam. Kumar’s mobile number IMEI changed four times between September 2021 and July 2022, according to the charge sheet.

The agency contended that a ₹45 crore bribe, mostly taken through hawala from the South Group, was used in AAP’s 2022 Goa election campaign. It cited statements from Sisodia’s close aide Dinesh Arora and individuals from companies involved in routing cash payments.

The South Group, according to ED, is a conglomerate of politicians and business people that got at least nine retail zones in Delhi’s liquor business. The agency has named YSR Congress parliamentarian Magunta Sreenivasulu Reddy (or MSR), his son Raghav Magunta, Sarath Reddy (promoter of Aurobindo Group), K Kavitha (daughter of Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao) and Sameer Mahendru, the owner of Indo Spirits.

Cash payments were allegedly made to people engaged in AAP’s Goa groundwork, managed by former AAP communications in-charge Vijay Nair and MLA Pathak, ED has claimed. An AAP Goa candidate reportedly received cash from AAP volunteers for election expenses, corroborating the dissipation/utilisation of proceeds of crime by Sisodia’s representative in the Goa polls, according to the agency.

ED has alleged that Kejriwal used his position as Delhi’s chief minister to commit money laundering and benefit AAP, making him and the party liable for prosecution under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). It defines AAP as a “company” under the PMLA.

The agency has said Kejriwal was not only the brain behind the AAP but also someone who controls its major activities.

Kejriwal, in response, has accused ED of trying to “implicate” him in a false case. The chief minister argued his own case during the remand hearing, where he alleged that ED was pressuring witnesses in the case. “They recorded statement after statement of (member of Parliament) Magunta Srinivasulu Reddy till he did not give a statement against me. After he changed his statement, he was released,” he said, citing an example. Reddy was granted pardon after he became an approver and was released on bail by the Delhi high court in August last year.

Kejriwal is the third major AAP leader to be arrested in the probe after his former deputy and senior AAP leader Manish Sisodia as well as the party’s Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh. This apart, ED arrested Bharat Rashtra Samithi leader and Telangana lawmaker K Kavitha in the case.

Read here: Delhi high court slams ex-AAP MLA on plea to remove Arvind Kejriwal as CM: ‘Heavy costs…’

Singh secured bail on April 2 after ED did not oppose his request. The “concession” from ED came an hour after the court asked the agency why Singh should be kept behind bars after serving six months in jail, considering that there doesn’t appear to be any concrete evidence against him, and no money has been recovered from him to link him to the alleged money laundering offence.

“It is a conspiracy by the BJP to stop the AAP from campaigning. The BJP and ED have formed a political alliance. BJP wants to remove AAP leaders from election campaign at any cost,” Atishi said in a statement.

Delhi BJP spokesperson Praveen Shankar Kapoor said the questioning was “not unusual”.

“Their names have cropped up during the investigation of the case and it seems they both were called for proper investigations,” said Kapoor.