New Delhi: An Enforcement Directorate team on Thursday reached Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s house hours after the Delhi high court refused to grant any protection to the chief minister from coercive action against him in the liquor probe. The high court said it was not inclined to grant relief at this stage. Soon after the order, ED officials reached Kejriwal’s residence. AAP leader Saurabh Bharadwaj was not allowed to enter Kejriwal’s house. Delhi Police barricaded the roads leading to Kejriwal’s house.
ED officials said they went to Kejriwal’s residence to serve him a summons in the case. However, reports said the officials had a search warrant and a raid was going on at Kejriwal’s residence. It was also reported that Kejriwal might be interrogated. The chief minister since last year has skipped multiple summons by the agency.
“It seems like there is a raid going on in Kejriwal’s residence. The way they are not allowing anyone to enter it looks like they are preparing for Kejriwal’s arrest,” Saurabh Bhardwaj said.
The court hearing Kejriwal’s matter on Thursday asked the chief minister why he had not approached the lower court seeking anticipatory bail if he was apprehending arrest. “Until and unless you attend any of the call, how would you know what information do they want? The summons started from the month of October. If you had apprehension that if you attend their call .. then why did you not challenge? What prevented you to not go to the court below from filing an anticipatory bail?” the bench asked.
The case pertains to alleged corruption and money laundering in formulating and executing the Delhi government’s excise policy for 2021-22, which was later scrapped.
AAP leaders Manish Sisodia and Sanjay Singh are in judicial custody in the case.
Kejriwal’s name has been mentioned multiple times in the charge sheets filed by the ED. The agency has alleged that the accused were in touch with Kejriwal for formulating the excise policy that resulted in undue benefits to them in return for which they paid kickbacks to the AAP.
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