NewDelhi: Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia on Monday (August 22, 2022) claimed that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has approached him with an offer to withdraw all the CBI and ED cases against him if he leaves the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and joins them. Sisodia also said that he “won’t bow down” before the conspirators and corrupt people, and stated that all cases against him are “false”.
“I’ve received a message from BJP – Leave “AAP” and join BJP, all CBI ED cases will be closed. My reply to BJP – I am a Rajput, a descendant of Maharana Pratap. I will cut off my head but will not bow down in front of the corrupt-conspirators. All the cases against me are false. Do whatever you want to do,” he said in a tweet in Hindi.
Facing the heat in the excise policy “corruption” case, Sisodia on Sunday claimed that the CBI has issued a Look Out Circular (LOC) against him.
In a tweet, he said that the CBI found “nothing” during the raid at his residence on Friday and added that the agency was doing a drama by issuing a LOC against him when he is “roaming freely” in Delhi.
He also asked Prime Minister Narendra Modi if he is unable to find him.
Agency officials, however, denied it and said the LOCs were only against eight “private” persons named in the FIR.
The AAP leader, who is among 15 people and entities named in an FIR registered by the CBI in connection with alleged irregularities in the implementation of the Delhi excise policy, has stressed that the case against him is an effort to stop the good work being done by CM Arvind Kejriwal-led dispensation and also to put obstacles in the path of the AAP chief who has emerged as an alternative to PM Modi.
Last week, the CBI raided 31 locations including Sisodia’s residence in connection with alleged irregularities in the Delhi government’s Excise Policy 2021-22. The CBI raids came after Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena last month recommended a probe by the agency into the alleged violations of rules and procedural lapses in the implementation of the policy that came into effect on November 17 last year.
The Delhi government withdrew the policy in July after Saxena recommended the probe.
The CBI last week also began examining the accused and recorded the statements of three persons named in the FIR. It said more people will be questioned after examining the documents seized during the raids and other evidence.
The agency has named a total of nine private individuals as accused in the FIR including businessmen Vijay Nair, a former CEO of entertainment and event management company Only Much Louder; Manoj Rai, a former employee of Pernod Ricard; Amandeep Dhal, owner of Brindco Spirits; Sameer Mahendru, MD of IndoSpirit, and Hyderabad-based Arun Ramchandra Pillai.
Sisodia’s three “close associates” — Amit Arora, Director of Buddy Retail Pvt. Limited in Gurgaon, Dinesh Arora and Arjun Pandey — have also been named in the FIR as accused.
Bureau Report
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