The Enforcement Directorate has issued the eighth summon to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, who has skipped seven notices so far linked to the alleged excise policy "scam". Official sources said Kejriwal has been asked to depose on March 4 at the agency's headquarters in Delhi.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) supremo on Monday skipped the seventh ED summons to him in connection with the money laundering probe linked to the Delhi excise policy scam case, saying he will appear before the agency if a court orders him to do so.
Kejriwal asked whether the Union government and the ED do not trust the court and said the probe agency itself moved the court in the matter and they should now wait for its order.
The ED summon pertains to the excise policy-linked money laundering case, for which his party colleagues Manish Sisodia and Satyendar Jain have been jailed. Satyendar Jain is currently out on bail.
Allegations are that Delhi government's excise policy for 2021-22 to grant licences to liquor traders allowed cartelisation and favoured certain dealers who had allegedly paid bribes for it, a charge repeatedly refuted by AAP. The policy was subsequently scrapped and the Delhi lieutenant governor recommended a CBI probe, following which the ED registered a case under the PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act).
The previous ED summons have been issued to Arvind Kejriwal on February 26, February 19, February 2, January 18, January 3 this year and December 21, November 2 last year.
Kejriwal and his party have alleged that the summons issued by the ED are "illegal". They want us to break the alliance. Their message basically is that we should quit the alliance, Kejriwal said on Monday, claiming there were informal messages to that effect from different quarters.
Kejriwal complained that ED has been issuing him summons after summons even as the court was hearing the matter.
