The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Monday submitted its final charge sheet in the Rouse Avenue Court against Delhi chief minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal and others in connection with the excise policy 'scam'. The charge sheet had some scathing revelations against the Delhi CM and AAP supremo.
As per CBI's chargesheet against K Kavitha, TDP MP and liquor businessman Magunta Sreenivasulu Reddy met Arvind Kejriwal on March 16, 2021 in the latter's office at the Delhi Secretariat.
The chargesheet further requested him to support his liquor business in Delhi by tweaking the Excise Policy 2021-22 which was then in the making.
Furthermore, the chargesheet mentions that Kejriwal assured support to Reddy and asked him to contact the accused K Kavitha as she was working with his team on Delhi's Excise Policy. Kejriwal also told Reddy to provide funds for his political party -- Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the CBI alleged.
Going ahead, the central agency mentioned that some people in the liquor business of South India paid kickbacks of around Rs 90-100 crore in advance to some AAP politicians and other public servants through co-accused Vijay Nair, Abhishek Boinpally and Dinesh Arora to make changes to the Excise Policy 2021-22 to benefit themselves.
The agency also stated in its chargesheet that these kickbacks were returned to some conspirators from the South lobby subsequently out of the profit margins of wholesalers having L-1 licenses through different modes. Some of these included issuance of excess credit notes, bank transfers, and outstanding amounts left in accounts of the companies controlled.
Further, the CBI alleged that a cartel was formed between the three stakeholders of the now-scrapped Excise Policy Case -- liquor manufacturers, wholesalers and retailers -- by violating provisions. It further mentioned that all the conspirators played active roles in achieving the illegal objectives of the said criminal conspiracy, resulting in huge losses to the exchequer and undue benefits to the public servants and other accused involved.