Excise case: Delhi court sends director of Buddy Retail Amit Arora to judicial custody
Dec 14, 2022
New Delhi [India], December 14 : The Rouse Avenue Court on Wednesday sent Amit Arora, director of Buddy Retail Pvt Ltd, to judicial custody in connection with the alleged Delhi Excise Policy scam money laundering case.
Special Judge MK Nagpal decided to send Amit Arora to judicial custody till December 28, 2022. The Enforcement Directorate on Wednesday produced him before the court after his remand period got over. He was earlier in ED remand for 14 days.
Earlier, while seeking remand ED's special public prosecutor Naveen Kumar Matta had submitted that large-scale destruction of digital evidence done by the accused to derail the investigation. He is the manufacturer, retailer and wholesaler. He had one license of L1 (Wholesale) and two additional licenses.
ED told the court that on the basis of the investigation conducted so far indicating that Amit Arora is actually involved in the activity connected to the acquisition, possession and use of proceeds of crime and therefore, Amit Arora is guilty of the offence of money laundering.
Further, he has not cooperated in the investigation by withholding information which is in his exclusive knowledge and extremely relevant to the investigation.
ED while seeking remand also submitted that huge digital/physical records have been seized during 171 search operations conducted to date by this Directorate under Section 17 of PMLA, 2002. The same needs to be confronted with the arrestee Amit Arora.
Arora's name is mentioned both in the ED and the Central Bureau of Investigation cases as accused along with Dinesh Arora, another director of Buddy Retail Pvt Ltd. Other accused named are Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia, the then Excise Commissioner Arva Gopi Krishna, Deputy Commissioner Anand Tiwari and Assistant Commissioner Pankaj Bhatnagar.
Manoj Rai, a former employee of Pernod Ricard; Amandeep Dhal, director of Brindco Sales; authorised signatories of Mahadev Liquors Sunny Marwah, Arun Ramchandra Pillai and Arjun Pandey are some more accused in the case.
The agency's move comes days after the agency filed its first chargesheet before a court in the national capital in the Delhi excise policy money laundering case naming liquor businessman Sameer Mahandru as one of the accused.
The agency said it has so far undertaken 169 search operations in this case, filed after taking cognisance of a CBI FIR which was registered on the recommendation of the Delhi lieutenant governor.
The CBI inquiry was recommended on the findings of the Delhi chief secretary's report filed in July showing prima facie violations of the GNCTD Act 1991, Transaction of Business Rules (ToBR)-1993, Delhi Excise Act-2009, and Delhi Excise Rules-2010, officials had said.
A total of six people have been arrested by the ED in this case till now.
In October, the ED had raided nearly three dozen locations in Delhi and Punjab following the arrest of Sameer Mahendru, Managing Director of Delhi's Jor Bagh-based liquor distributor Indospirit Group, in the case.
The ED and the CBI have alleged that irregularities were committed while modifying the Excise Policy, undue favours were extended to licence holders, the licence fee was waived or reduced and the L-1 licence was extended without the competent authority's approval. The beneficiaries diverted "illegal" gains to the accused officials and made false entries in their books of account to evade detection.
