BJP shamelessly ‘peddled lies’ before Chhattisgarh polls to implicate Baghel: Cong

With the Supreme Court quashing an ED case against a former IAS officer and his son in the alleged liquor scam in Chhattisgarh, the Congress on Wednesday said the BJP ‘shamelessly peddled’ lies before the Assembly polls to implicate former chief minister Bhupesh Baghel but the entire case was ‘politically motivated’.

Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh claimed Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s use of ED, CBI and Income Tax department to hound all INDIA bloc politicians, and his use of the ‘washing machine’ to purify the BJP’s politicians, has killed anti-corruption movements and initiatives across the country. “The Supreme Court revealed that the Chhattisgarh ‘liquor scam’ was in fact shamelessly fabricated by the ED. The BJP, through its frontal organisation the Enforcement Directorate (ED), had shamelessly peddled this lie before the Chhattisgarh polls last year, trying to implicate former CM Bhupesh Baghel in the ‘syndicate’. There is no longer any doubt that the entire case was politically motivated,” Ramesh said on X. In the complaint filed before the PMLA special court, the ED had alleged that a criminal syndicate of politicians, private persons, and senior government officials had siphoned off Rs 2,161 crore by selling liquor illegally from 2019 to 2022, Ramesh said. Former IAS officer Anil Tuteja and his son Yash were portrayed as the “kingpins” of this syndicate, he added.

“A bench headed by Justice A.S. Oka swiftly quashed this complaint. The court proceedings reveal just how hollow the case really was: The Tutejas were not even named as the accused in the complaint. None of the alleged offences fell under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). There was no predicate offence (first act in the chain of a crime) or proceeds of the crime.