A team of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has reached Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's residence in North Delhi's Civil Lines, hours after he was denied protection by the High Court. India Today reported that 10-12 ED officials are carrying out search operations at Kejriwal's residence and he may likely be arrested tonight.
The probe agency team is recording Kejriwal's statement under Section 50 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). Heavy police deployment has been made, with a team of Rapid Action Force (RAF) standing outside the residence of Kejriwal.
Sources also told India Today that the officer who arrested Kavitha is leading the search operation at Kejriwal's residence. The legal team of Arvind Kejriwal immediately approached the Supreme Court seeking an urgent hearing in the matter, sources told India Today.
Earlier today, the Delhi HC refused to grant Kejriwal any protection from coercive action in the excise policy case. During the hearing, the HC asked the probe agency to prove it had materials against the chief minister. After examining the materials provided by the agency, the court denied relief to Kejriwal.
A bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain listed Kejriwal's application seeking protection for further consideration on April 22 when his main petition challenging the summons is fixed for hearing.
The application for interim relief forms part of Kejriwal's petition challenging the ED's summonses issued to him for questioning. Kejriwal moved the court in the wake of the latest summons, the ninth issued by the ED, asking him to appear before it on Thursday. Kejriwal has skipped 9 summons, calling them illegal.
The ED's raids comes just days after it arrested BRS leader K Kavitha in the same case. The CBI recently told a court that some high-profile persons may be arrested in the excise policy case.
After arresting the BRS leader, the ED said Kavitha conspired with Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia for favours through the new excise policy. It said Kavitha conspired with the top leaders of AAP, including Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia to get favours in the Delhi Excise policy formulation and implementation. "She was involved in paying Rs 100 Crore to the leaders of AAP."
The central probe agency also claimed that a continuous stream of illegal funds in the form of kickbacks, from the wholesalers was generated for the AAP. "Kavitha and her associates were to recover the proceeds of crime paid in advance to AAP and to further generate profits/proceeds of crime from this entire conspiracy."
Interestingly, conman Sukesh Chandrashekhar recently said Kejriwal is going to be exposed to another level. "All your corrupt associates, including the king of corruption, my dearest Arvind Kejriwal, are going to be exposed to another level," the conman said in a letter to Kavitha, the daughter of former Telangana Chief Minister KCR. "Thousands of crores that you and your party have looted and stacked in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Germany will all be out in the open," he said.
In the excise policy case, the ED has, so far, conducted searches at 245 locations across the country, including Delhi, Hyderabad, Chennai, Mumbai, and other places. The agency has also arrested 15 persons, including former Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia, Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh, and Vijay Nair.
Further, assets worth Rs 128.79 crore have been traced, the ED said in a statement on March 17.