Delhi excise policy: ED files fresh charge sheet; names BRS leader K Kavitha, 4 others

New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday filed a fresh charge sheet in the Delhi excise policy-linked money laundering case naming BRS leader K Kavitha and four others as accused, official sources said.

The sources said the nearly 200-page prosecution complaint (charge sheet) along with annexures was filed under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) at the Rouse Avenue court here. Kavitha, an MLC of the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) party, three employees of a company that handled AAP’s Goa campaign (Chariot Productions Media Pvt Ltd) - Damodar Sharma, Prince Kumar and Chanpreet Singh - besides a former employee of India Ahead News Channel Arvind Singh have been named as accused in the latest charge sheet, they said.

Kaveri Baweja, the special judge for ED and CBI cases, is likely to take up the charge sheet for cognisance on May 13. A similar complaint against Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is expected to be filed next week.

The federal agency had arrested 46-year-old Kavitha, the daughter of former Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao, from her Banjara hills residence in Hyderabad on March 15.

Chanpreet was arrested on April 15 and it was alleged by the agency that he “managed” cash funds for AAP’s 2022 Goa assembly campaign. The three Chariot company employees too had alleged role in the movement and handling of “bribe” funds paid by the ‘South Group’ through ‘Angadiyas’ and hawala route for the party’s Goa campaign.

Arvind Singh, the commercial head and production controller of India Ahead News, was arrested by the CBI in this case in May last year for alleged transfer of these funds that have been called “kickbacks” of this “scam”.

This is the seventh charge sheet filed by the ED in this case in which it has arrested 18 people so far including Kejriwal, who was given interim bail by the Supreme Court on Friday. The ED has alleged that Kavitha was a key member of the ‘South Group’ that has been accused of paying the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) alleged kickbacks of Rs 100 crore in return for a big share of liquor licences in the national capital, as part of the excise policy for 2021-22 which has was scrapped following allegations of corruption and cartelisation of liquor traders.