The Enforcement Directorate on Tuesday raided the residences of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s personal assistant Bibhav Kumar and some other Aam Aadmi Party leaders. The raids are an ongoing part of a money laundering probe linked to alleged irregularities in the Delhi Jal B0ard, as per official sources.
10-12 premises in the national capital region are being covered as part of the raids being undertaken under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) by the enforcement agency.
The residences of Bibhav Kumar, former Delhi Jal Board member Shalabh Kumar, office of party Rajya Sabha MP and national treasurer N D Gupta and some others are being covered by officials of the central agency.
The raids are connected to a probe underway on alleged irregularities in the tendering process of the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) in which the Enforcement Directorate arrested retired chief engineer Jagdish Kumar Arora and Anil Kumar Aggarwal, a contractor, last week.
A special PMLA court on Monday has extended their remand by five more days after the agency claimed that their further custodial interrogation was required to unearth the “larger conspiracy”.
AAP Minister Atishi Claims Raids Being Conducted To Scare Party Representatives
The raids happened on a day when Delhi cabinet minister Atishi had promised to do an “explosive expose” on the agency.
In a press conference, the minister claimed that the ED ‘deleted’ audio recording of witness statements in certain cases, including the excise policy probe that is being investigated against Aam Admi Party functionaries. She challenged the investigating agency to produce them in front of the court and the country.
Atishi charged that the latest raids on AAP leaders were being carried out to “scare” the party. She alleged that the ongoing investigation is a scam and the frequent raids were being conducted to frighten the Aam Admi Party representatives. She said searches so far had not revealed anything and no recovery had been made.
Irregularities In Tendering Being Probed By Enforcement Directorate
The Enforcement Directorate is probing matters of irregularities in the tendering process of the Delhi Jal Board and its criminal case stems from an FIR of the CBI and from the Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) of the Delhi government.
The CBI FIR alleged that officials of the DJB gave “undue advantage” to NKG Infrastructure Limited while awarding the tender to the organization. The job was the supply, installation, testing, and commissioning of electro-magnetic flow metres in collusion with officials of the NBCC (lndia) Limited.
The second allegation pertains to the ACB complaint of November, 2022. The complaint alleged that the DJB awarded a tender for setting up automotive bill payment collection machines (kiosks) in its different offices for facilitating consumers in bill payment without due process.
Bengali