Former Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia has filed a petition before the Supreme Court seeking a review of the top court’s judgement rejecting his bail application, The Hindu reported.
A bench of Justices Sanjiv Khanna and SVN Bhatti had on October 30 rejected Sisodia’s bail plea in the cases filed by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate in connection with alleged irregularities in the national capital’s now-scrapped liquor policy.
The court said that the authorities have tentatively established a money trail worth Rs 338 crore. It, however, ordered that the trial in the case should be completed within six to eight months.
Sisodia was arrested on February 26 in connection with the Delhi government’s excise policy that came into effect in November 2021. On March 9, the Enforcement Directorate arrested him in the same case.
The Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate have alleged that the Aam Aadmi Party government in Delhi modified the liquor excise policy to ensure a 12% profit margin for wholesalers and a nearly 185% profit margin for retailers. Sisodia handled 18 portfolios at the time, including the excise department.
The Enforcement Directorate has claimed that members of a so-called South Group had paid at least Rs 100 crore in kickbacks to leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party through businessman Vijay Nair. The agency also alleged that the “South Group secured uninhibited access, attained stakes in established wholesale businesses and multiple retail zones [over and above what was allowed in the policy].”
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