New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate has claimed before a Delhi court that AAP leader and former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia was involved in “large-scale destruction of digital evidence to hinder the investigation” in the Delhi Excise Policy case and that he changed 14 phones and destroyed.
In its remand application seeking Sisodia’s custody extension, the agency on Friday said key recommendations that would eventually form the basis for the Excise Policy 2021-22, including fixing 12 per cent profit margin for wholesalers, had not been finalized in the grouping. . Number of Ministers (GoM) meetings and instead “imported from outside sources”.
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) had arrested Sisodia on March 9 in Tihar Jail, where he was lodged in connection with the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) case in connection with alleged corruption in the formulation and implementation of the shutdown policy. He was arrested by the CBI on 26 February.
The ED is probing money laundering charges against the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader.
The application before Special Judge MK Nagpal, who extended Sisodia’s custody for five days, also claimed that the probe conducted so far indicated that Sisodia was “in fact involved in acquisition, possession and use of proceeds of crime”. connected activity” and “therefore guilty of the offense of money laundering”.
The ED, in its application, had sought extension of Sisodia’s custody for seven more days.
The agency alleged that Sisodia suppressed information which was his “exclusive information” and “extremely relevant to the probe”.
The application said that facts emerged after Sisodia’s custodial interrogation that he was “indulging in destruction of digital evidence on a large scale to obstruct the investigation and destroy evidence”.
It alleged that during the one-year period of the liquor scam, Sisodia changed or destroyed 14 phones or IMEIs, out of which only one phone could be recovered by the CBI and two were produced during interrogation by the ED.
The application claimed that Sisodia had replaced or destroyed most of these phones since the day the Lieutenant Governor (LG) of Delhi complained to the CBI, which was also reported by the media on July 22 last year .
When asked about the reason for changing the phone on July 22 last year, Sisodia said that the phone was damaged, but he was unable to answer what he did with the broken or damaged phone.
“This conclusion of destruction of mobile phones is based on the fact that these 11 mobile phones or IMELs were not recovered during the intensive search or questioning conducted by the central probe agencies,” the ED said.
The application claimed that Sisodia had also used phones bought in the name of other people so that he had the excuse that the phones were not bought by him and belonged to others.
“Mass destruction of digital evidence is the act of intentionally destroying the proceeds of crime, money trail as well as evidence of involvement in the offense of money laundering by destroying evidence of involvement in the process or activities connected with the proceeds of crime.” of the offense to commit the offense of money laundering,” it said.
The application alleged that the “destruction of evidence” led to the sole conclusion that Sisodia made “conscious efforts to destroy the evidence of the offense of money laundering”. Claiming that the 12 per cent profit margin for wholesalers was fixed in connivance with a “southern group”, it was found from the statements of various officials of the excise department and other physical evidence that Group of Ministers (GoM) meetings “There was only a sham and no discussion or decision was taken in these GoM meetings”. The “South Group” is an alleged liquor cartel which paid a bribe of around Rs 100 crore to AAP to get a major share of the market in the national capital under the now-cancelled Policy 2020-21. According to the ED, the “southern group” includes Sarath Reddy (promoter of Aurobindo Pharma), Magunta Srinivasulu Reddy (YSR Congress MP from Ongole in Andhra Pradesh), his son Raghav Magunta, K Kavitha, BRS leader and daughter of the Telangana chief minister. Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao, And Ors. “The major recommendations presented in the GoM report (including fixing 12 per cent commission) were neither discussed nor decided in these so-called GoM meetings. These recommendations which eventually became the basis for the Excise Policy 2021-22 were sought from outside sources. was imported.” Which has not been disclosed by Manish Sisodia so far,” the application alleged.
It claimed that according to officials of the Excise Department, who were questioned and also confronted during Sisodia’s custody, the department did not participate in decision-making or the actual drafting of the GoM report. “The changes in the draft GOM report (from 5 per cent to 12 per cent) which overlap with the stay of the members or representatives of the South Group…the period during which a print was taken at the hotel and a document in the application It has been claimed that there is clear evidence of collusion with the Dakshin Group to increase the profit margin of wholesalers entrusted by Manish Sisodia from 5 per cent to 12 per cent.
It alleged that two days before the GoM submitted its report to the Council of Ministers, parts of the GoM’s final report were found in the mobile phones of “South Group” members.
It added that during Sisodia’s interrogation, he was confronted by several people and apart from extracting his mobile phone data, the agency also took his iCloud and email dumps. The application stated that the mail dump contained 1.23 lakh mails and was being analyzed and needed to be confronted with Sisodia.
It said that other “important information” had also come to the fore during Sisodia’s custody and in view of the findings, the ED had summoned four people to confront the AAP leader — former excise commissioners Rahul Singh, C Aravind, deputy chief K. The then secretary ministers Amit Arora and Dinesh Arora. Former Excise Commissioner Rahul Singh is not an accused in the case.
Earlier, the present court had on March 10 sent Sisodia to one week’s ED custody.
(This story has been published as part of an auto-generated syndicated wire feed. No edits have been made to the copy by ABP Live except for the headline.)
