AAP Is Alleged By ED In Scamming Money To Fund The Goa Poll Campaign.

The ED has accused the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) of using some of the alleged 100 crore bribes from the south group’s liquor lobby to fund its Goa Assembly election campaign in 2022. 

The claim was made in the supplemental charge sheet submitted by the CBI in the Delhi Excise policy-related money laundering issue.

In the prosecution issue, it has named Chariot Productions Media Pvt. Ltd. and its owner-promoter, Rajesh Joshi, as defendants. Recently, a Delhi court took cognisance of this charge sheet.

According to the sources, a careful analysis of the investigation’s conclusions revealed that several people, including Rajesh Joshi and his company Chariot Productions Media Pvt Ltd, are involved in several processes or activities related to a portion of the proceeds of crime, namely the 100 crore kickbacks received from the South Group.

Chariot Productions Media Pvt Ltd is involved in making payments through banking channels and cash through the Hawala network, and the ultimate recipient of these payments is AAP since these funds were utilised to cover the expenditures of the Goa Elections in 2022.

It stated that a money laundering probe launched by it, in this issue, in 2022 under the criminal sections of the PMLA, found that a part of the proceedings of crime totalling 30 crores was transferred through the Hawala network to pay vendors for advertisements in the AAP’s Goa election campaign. The payment was paid in banknotes and also through a banking channel.

A part of the money trail of proceedings of crime of Rs. 80 lahks (approx.) is tracked back to advertisement vendors and surveys for AAP during Goa elections, according to the charge sheet submitted in this subject the earlier month before a local court. All of these transactions are interconnected and represent the use of 100 crores in proceeds of crime through different multiple processes and actions that are interconnected because ultimately, all of the money was used by AAP leaders, including ministers and the associates in the AAP government who were the architects of this liquor fraud, it claims.

As in an earlier charge sheet, the entity mentioned AAP leader and MP Raghav Chadha’s name in a statement registered by former Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia’s secretary C Arvind.

Chadha stated that he had not been mentioned to be an accused in an ED complaint and that press stories in this context are factually erroneous and emerge to be part of a malicious propaganda campaign to undermine his reputation and integrity. 

He added that he had not been put on trial or even as a suspect in any of the Enforcement Directorate’s allegations. There are no claims against him in the aforementioned complaints. His name emerges to be included in the complaint to be attendance at some conference, though the basis for making such a claim is unclear. He stated that he passionately denies any claimed wrongdoing, whether related to the reported meeting or elsewhere.

In addition to Joshi, the ED detained Nair, the AAP’s communications in charge in the case.

The south group’s liquor lobby is purportedly related to Telangana CM K Chandrashekhar Rao’s MLC daughter K Kavitha and YSR Congress MP Magunta Srinivasulu Reddy, his son Raghav Magunta, and others.

The ED further stated that Kavitha had “multiple meetings” with Nair before and after the policy was established and implemented.

Similarly, Magunta Sriniavasulu Reddy met with Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, who applauded his entry into the Delhi spirits market, according to the ED.

The ED has arrested a total of 12 persons in the probe to date, including Sisodia, who is in judicial custody.

The ED voiced statements made by Buchi Babu, an accountant allegedly linked to Kavitha, who told the agency that the south group’s kickbacks are related to the Delhi excise policy and top AAP leaders like Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia (minister concerned), as revealed by Buchi Babu and Arun Pillai.

Buchi Babu and Arun Pillai have stated that Vijay Nair was working on all excise policy-related operations, including development and implementation, with the approval and consent of Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia.

The Delhi government’s excise policy for 2021-22, which grants licences to liquor dealers, is said to have facilitated cartelisation and favoured particular dealers who reportedly paid bribes for it, a claim strenuously denied by the AAP.

The policy was later repealed, and the lieutenant governor of Delhi urged a CBI probe, which prompted the ED to file a case under the PMLA.

Edited By, Naveenika Chauhan