ED mulls legal action after Atishi says witnesses being pressured

Samad Hoque

New Delhi, February 6

In a fresh flashpoint between the Enforcement Directorate and AAP, the probe agency today said it was mulling legal action after Delhi Cabinet minister Atishi levelled “false accusations that the probe agency pressured witnesses and the accused in the ongoing liquor scam investigations to implicate the ruling party leaders”.

Investigating agency denies allegations

Enforcement Directorate sources on Tuesday refuted claims that audio recordings were ‘deleted’ from the statement of an accused in the Delhi excise policy-linked money laundering case, adding that they will take a ‘legal recourse’ against Delhi minister Atishi for levelling such allegations. They said the footage was recorded in video-only format during interrogation as the CCTV system did not have audio recording facility at the time. Audio recordings were added to the video capturing system of the ED interrogation process only in October last year, sources said.

Case was registered on jan 31

• The ED had arrested former Delhi Jal Board chief engineer Jagdish Kumar Arora and contractor Anil Kumar Aggarwal on January 31 under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act
• The agency had alleged that Arora had awarded a contract of Rs 38.02 crore to NKG Infrastructure Ltd without meeting the technical eligibility criteria
• The investigation revealed that the firm had obtained the bid by submitting forged documents. The probe agency alleged that Arora was aware of the fact that the company does not meet the criteria for the tender. It further alleged that Arora received Rs 3 crore as bribe from Aggarwal.

“All charges levelled by AAP leaders are false and baseless. We may take serious legal action,” sources said after ED officials held a meeting following a press conference by Atishi.

Atishi challenged the ED to provide details of audio recordings of the purported statements of government approvers in the liquor scam case.

“If the ED fails to do so then it will be proved that this investigation is a complete fraud,” she said even as ED teams raided the residences of AAP’s Rajya Sabha member ND Gupta and Bibhav Kumar, personal secretary to Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. The ED conducted raids in connection with a Delhi Jal Board (DJB) case. Last week, the ED had arrested former DJB chief engineer Jagdish Kumar Arora and one Anil Kumar Agarwal for alleged corruption in awarding a contract to a company — NKG Infrastructure Ltd.

The ED had alleged that the company did not meet the “technical eligibility criteria” and also alleged that Arora received Rs 3 crore as bribe.

The raids came a day after Atishi had said on X that she would expose the ED.

At her press conference, Atishi said, “This is the way the BJP is trying to threaten the AAP and intimidate its leaders to suppress their voices. But despite such investigations for nearly two years, ED has not been able to find anything.” The Delhi minister said if ED registers a case under PMLA, three things are extremely important — recovery of money, evidence and statements. However, despite an investigation of two years, the ED has not been able to recover even a single penny, no solid evidence has been found and ED’s case is based on statements of witnesses and accused who have been turned into government witnesses.” She alleged that many accused, witnesses and government witnesses came forward and told the party that they were pressured to record their statements.

“One of the witnesses claimed he was slapped so hard by the ED officials that his eardrum ruptured and he gave a statement under pressure. Another witness said he was threatened that his wife would also be arrested if he did not give the statement against AAP leaders,” she claimed.

Atishi based the accusations on a 2020 Supreme Court order wherein any investigating agency is bound to conduct its investigation in CCTV surveillance. The order, she said, mentions that CCTV footage should be available in both audio and video formats.

“This order was given to ensure transparency and that no witness is threatened or forced to give any statement against his/her will. The same order was reiterated by CBI Special Court Justice MK Nagpal in the excise policy case on July 19 when an accused in the case sought CCTV footage of the ED investigation,” she said. “But when the footage was produced in court, it was found that the statement produced in court and during the investigation in the room is completely different. Also, when the ED gave the footage, it deleted the audio of that footage. The ED deleted all conversations that happened in that room, and evidence was tampered with,” she alleged.

She said, “Not only in this matter, but AAP has information from trusted sources that all audio files of the footage of investigations done by the ED in the past one-and-a-half years have been deleted by the ED.”

Challenging the ED, Atishi said, “I am challenging ED and CBI on this, and we have filed an application in the special courts of both agencies and have demanded these audio-visual recordings.”