Excise Policy: ED carrying out raids in 35 locations in Delhi, Punjab, Hyderabad

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on is carrying out searches in about 35 locations in Delhi, Punjab and some places in Hyderabad, news agency PTI citing official sources.

The raids were conducted in connection with its money laundering investigation into alleged irregularities in the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy, official sources said.

As per sources, some liquor distributors, companies and linked entities are being searched.

In response to the raids being conducted, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal has said that over 500 raids have been done till now. It also attacked and termed these raids as dirty politics of Centre.

In a Tweet in Hindi, Kejriwal wrote, "More than 500 raids, since 3 months more than 300 CBI/ED officers are working 24 hours – one to find evidence against Manish Sisodia. Can't find anything. because nothing was done."

As per PTI report, so far, the ED has conducted more than 103 raids in this case till now.

Earlier, the agency had also arrested Sameer Mahandru, a liquor businessman and managing director of liquor manufacturing company Indospirit last month in the case. The money laundering case stems from a CBI FIR.

Among the accused in the case are Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, the then Excise Commissioner Arva Gopi Krishna, Deputy Commissioner Anand Tiwari and Assistant Commissioner Pankaj Bhatnagar.

Other accused are Manoj Rai, a former employee of Pernod Ricard; Amandeep Dhal, director of Brindco Sales; director of Buddy Retail Amit Arora, and Dinesh Arora; authorised signatories of Mahadev Liquors Sunny Marwah, Arun Ramchandra Pillai and Arjun Pandey.

The ED and the CBI had alleged that irregularities were committed while modifying the Excise Policy, undue favours were extended to licence holders, the licence fee was waived or reduced and the L-1 licence was extended without the competent authority's approval. The beneficiaries diverted "illegal" gains to the accused officials and made false entries in their books of account to evade detection.

As alleged, the Excise Department had decided to refund the Earnest Money Deposit of about ₹30 crore to a successful tenderer against the set rules. Even though there was no enabling provision, a waiver on tendered licence fees was allowed from December 28, 2021, to January 27, 2022, due to COVID-19.

This allegedly caused a loss of ₹144.36 crore to the exchequer, said the FIR, which has been instituted on a reference from the Union Home Ministry following a recommendation from Delhi Lieutenant-Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena.

The liquor scheme came under the scanner after the Delhi LG recommended a CBI probe into the alleged irregularities in the implementation of Delhi's Excise Policy 2021-22. He had also suspended 11 excise officials in the matter.

(With inputs from PTI)