The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) listed 15 accused including Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia in an FIR on Friday 13th August 2022 following hours of raids into the alleged excise fraud. The excise department, which the deputy chief minister oversees, implemented a new strategy last year that ruled government liquor stores shut down and private businesses granted licenses. Along with Manish Sisodia and Excise officials, CBI has named several private persons for involvement in the scam. Apart from the 15 persons named in the FIR, CBI also included ‘other unknown public servants and private persons’ as accused in the FIR.
The CBI has conducted searches at various sites. Arva Gopi Krishna, the former excise commissioner, as well as deputy commissioner Anand Tiwari and assistant commissioner Pankaj Bhatnagar, are also booked by the CBI. Searches were conducted today at 31 locations including in Delhi, Gurugram, Chandigarh, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Lucknow, and Bengaluru which, so far, have led to the recovery of Incriminating documents/articles, digital records etc, according to the CBI.
It has been alleged that irregularities were committed in modifications in Excise Policy, extending undue favours to the lincencees, waiver/reduction in licence fee, extension of L-1 license without approval etc. It is further alleged that Illegal gains on the count of these acts were diverted to concerned public servants by private parties and making false entries in their books of accounts.
Delhi Dy CM Manish Sisodia among 15 persons booked by name in FIR filed by CBI. Excise officials, liquor company executives, dealers along with unknown public servants & private persons have too been booked in the case (addresses omitted, previous tweet had personal information) pic.twitter.com/44L12CmHNn
— ANI (@ANI) August 19, 2022
The FIR says, “Shri Manish Sisodia, Deputy Chief Minister, GNCTD of Delhi, Shri Arva Gopi Krishna, the then Commissioner (Excise), GNCTD of Delhi., Shri Anand Tiwari, the then Deputy Commissioner (Excise), GNCTD Of Delhi, and Shri Pankaj Bhatnagar, Assistant Commissioner (Excise), GNCTD of Delhi were instrumental in recommending and taking decisions pertaining to excise policy for the year 2021-22 without the approval of competent authority with an intention to extend undue favors to the licensees post tender.”
It further says, “Shri Vijay Nair, Former CEO of M/s. Only Much Louder, an entertainment and event management company, Shri Manoj Rai, Ex-employee of M/s Pernod Ricard, Shri Amandeep Dhal, Owner of M/s. Brinda Spirits & Sh Sameer Mahendru, Owner of M/s. Indo Spirits are actively involved in irregularities in framing and implementation of the excise policy of GNCTD of Delhi for the year 2021-22. Some of the L-1 Licence holders are issuing credit notes to retail vendors with an ab-initio intention to divert the funds as an undue pecuniary advantage to Public servants. In furtherance to this, they are showing false entries in their books of accounts to keep their record straight.”
The CBI cited its sources and said in the FIR, “Shri Amit Arora, Shri Dinesh Arora, and Shri Arjun Pandey are close associates of Shri Manish Sisodia and are actively involved in managing and diverting the undue pecuniary advantage collected from Liquor Licenses to accused public servants. Shri Arun Ramchandra Pillai used to collect undue pecuniary advantage from Shri Sameer Mahendru, MD, M/s Indospirit for onward transmission to the accused public servant through Shri Vijay Nair. A person named Arjun Pandey once collected a huge cash amount of about Rs.2-4 crores from Shri Sameer Mahendru on behalf of Shri Vijay Nair.”
CBI also mentioned that M/s Mahadev Liquors, a proprietorship firm was granted an L-1 License. Sunny Marwah is the authorized signatory of the firm. Sunny Marwah is also a director in companies being managed by the family of the Late Ponty Chadha. The CBI source has reportedly informed that Sunny Marwah is in close contact with accused public servants and has been regularly giving undue pecuniary advantage to them. The CBI has booked all the 15 accused under sections 120B, 477A of the Indian Penal Code and section 7 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1988 (amended in 2018).
The list of the accused includes deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, former excise commissioner Arva Gopi Krishna, former excise deputy commissioner Anand Tiwari, Assistant Excise Commissioner Pankaj Bhatnagar, former CEO of the OML entertainment and events company Vijay Nair, ex-employee of M/s Pernod Recard Manoj Rai, Director of M/s Brindco Sales Pvt. Ltd Amandeep Dhal, Managing Director of the lndospirit Group Sameer Mahendru, Director of M/s Buddy Retail Private Limited Amit Arora, Dinesh Arora, Buddy Retail Private Limited, Authorised Signatory of M/s Mahadev Liquors Sunny Marwah, Mahadev Liquors, Arun Ramchandra Pilla, and Arjun Pandey of the National Media Center of DLF.
One of the accused in this case – Vijay Nair is the former CEO of OML. Only Much Louder (OML) is a Mumbai-based firm noted for its NH7 Weekender concerts, supporting independent musicians, and being the company behind the comic collectives East India Comedy and All India Bakchod. His name earlier appeared in a cyberstalking case. Vijay Nair’s alleged stalker “Geeta” dragged his friends, colleagues, clients, and others in a series of tweets, and messages.
