NEW DELHI: The Enforcement Directorate (ED) was conducting raids at more than 40 locations throughout India on Friday as part of the lastest development in the Delhi Excise Policy Scam case.

Information indicates that the ED began executing raids in Bangalore, Hyderabad, Chennai, Delhi-NCR, and Nellore (Tamil Nadu) today morning. 

A team of the Enforcement Directorate was also all set to visit the Tihar Jail to record the statement of Delhi's Health Minister Satyendra Jain. The ED's case is based on an FIR of the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Manish Sisodia, the deputy chief minister of Delhi, is the primary defendant in the CBI's FIR. Sections 120-B (Criminal Conspiracy) and 477-A (Falsification of Accounts) of the IPC are the subject of the FIR filed by the CBI. Sisodia is accused of giving liquor industry executives an exemption worth Rs 30 crore. The licence holders allegedly received extensions at their discretion. The policy regulations were made by violating excise rules.

It also said that Sisodia and a few other liquor barons were actively involved in handling and transferring the undue pecuniary advantage obtained from liquor licence holders to the public employees named as defendants in the lawsuit.
According to the FIR, "Manish Sisodia, the deputy chief minister of Delhi, Arva Gopi Krishna, the then-commissioner of excise, Anand Tiwari, the then-deputy commissioner of excise, and Pankaj Bhatnagar, assistant commissioner of excise, were instrumental in recommending and taking decisions pertaining to excise policy for the year 2021–2022, without the approval of competent authority, with an intention to extend undue favours to the licensees post tender," as per FIR.

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