According to ED, their role was revealed by businessman Amit Arora who was arrested on Tuesday, 29 November.
The Enforcement Directorate carried out search-and-seize operations at 25 locations in multiple states. (Supplied)
In an application filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a Delhi court seeking 14 days custody of businessman Amit Arora, the investigation agency has named TRS MLC K Kavitha, YSRCP MP Magunta Srinivasul Reddy, and Aurobindo Pharma MD Sarath Reddy as people controlling what it called the “South Group” which paid ₹100 crore to the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Vijay Nair in the form of kickbacks.
In its sixth arrest, ED had picked up Arora, listed as one of the accused in the Delhi Liquor Scam, on Tuesday, 29 November.
Arora is the director of 13 companies, including Buddy Retail in Delhi. He figures in the charge sheets of both the CBI and the ED filed with Rouse Avenue District Court Delhi, recently.
In naming Kavitha, daughter of Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao, Srinivasul Reddy, and Aurobindo Pharma’s Sarath Reddy, the ED said information about their role was revealed by Arora himself in his statement.
In its application in the Rouse Avenue District Court, the ED said that Amit Arora was actively involved along with two others — Dinesh Arora and Arjun Pandey, both close associates of Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia — in “managing and diverting the undue pecuniary advantage” collected from liquor licensees to the accused public servants.
The ED said that in its PMLA investigation, it found that the Delhi Excise Policy was a device created by the leaders of AAP, some of who are part of Delhi government, to generate illegal funds at the cost of the state government exchequer.
The policy was formulated with deliberate loopholes with in-built mechanisms to facilitate illegal activities and is marred by deliberate inconsistencies which only reflected the malafide intentions of the policymakers, the ED said.
It promoted cartel formation through back-door, awarded exorbitant wholesale 12 percent discount and 185 percent huge retail profit margins. It also incentivised other illegal activities on account of criminal conspiracy of AAP, the agency added.
The ED said that the 12 percent profit margin to the wholesalers was devised to extract half of it as a kickback to the AAP leaders.
As per the investigation carried out by the ED so far, Vijay Nair, on behalf of the leaders of AAP, has at least received kickbacks to the tune of ₹100 crore from various people, including Amit Arora, through the “South Group”.
The same has been disclosed by Arora in his statements, the ED said.
The Delhi liquor scam broke when Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena recommended a CBI probe into suspected irregularities in the implementation of Delhi’s excise policy for the year 2021-22. Saxena also placed under suspension 11 excise officials.
ED sources had then said that Sarath Chandra Reddy was in direct control of five retail zones. And with other members of the cartel, controlled four zones.
This cartel effectively controlled 30 percent of the Delhi liquor market. He and others led a cartel that gave kickbacks of ₹100 crore through Vijay Nair, the ED sources had alleged.
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