Arvind Kejriwal becomes first sitting chief minister to be arrested in India

New Delhi: The Enforcement Directorate today arrested Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal in the alleged Delhi liquor excise policy scam after the Delhi High Court declined to give protection from arrest to Kejriwal in the liquor policy case.

Kejriwal, who avoided nine ED summons since the first summon was issued in October last year, has thus become the first sitting chief minister in Independent India to be arrested. His arrest was made reportedly under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act of 2002. 

ED claims that by the acts of corruption and conspiracy in the formulation and implementation of Delhi Excise Policy 2021-22, a continuous stream of illegal funds in the form of kickback, from the wholesalers had been generated for the AAP. 

“We have moved the Supreme Court for quashing the arrest of Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, by ED. We have asked for an urgent hearing by the Supreme Court tonight itself,” AAP leader and Delhi’s Education Minister Atishi, said.

In a late-night development, AAP leaders called a press conference and condemned Kejriwal’s arrest even when the case was pending before the court. 

The Aam Aadmi Party has called an “all India protest” tomorrow and said that Kejriwal will not resign and continue to hold the chief minister’s position. AAP said it would start the protest from the Bharatiya Janata Party’s headquarters in New Delhi. 

AAP Senior Leaders Addressing an Important Press Conference | LIVE https://t.co/J6j4oPgajV

— AAP (@AamAadmiParty) March 21, 2024

Earlier today the Delhi High Court refused to grant Kejriwal protection from arrest in the liquor policy case and a Bench of Justices Suresh Kumar Kait and Manoj Jain, while asking the ED to file a reply to his petition, listed the matter for the next hearing tomorrow.  “We have heard both sides, and we are not inclined at this stage (to grant protection). The respondent (ED) is at liberty to file a reply,” the Bench said.

About a couple of hours after the High Court’s order, An ED team reached Kejriwal’s residence with a search warrant. Kejriwal was questioned under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, and thereafter he was arrested and brought to the ED headquarters. Reports suggest the ED also confiscated phones, laptops and tablets from his home.

Already Kejriwal’s senior party leaders, former deputy chief minister of Delhi Manish Sisodiya and Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh, have been behind bars respectively since February and October 2023, in connection with this case.

Earlier on March 13, ED had also arrested another political bigwig, Kalvakuntla Kavitha, a Member of the Legislative Council, Telangana and daughter of former Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, in the case Delhi Liquor Policy scam.

ED investigation revealed that Kavitha along with others conspired with the top leaders of AAP including Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia to get favours in the Delhi Excise policy formulation and implementation.

In exchange for these favours, ED claimed she was involved in paying Rs. 100 Crore to the leaders of AAP. Further, Kavitha and her associates were to recover the proceeds of crime paid in advance to AAP and to further generate profits/proceeds of crime from this entire conspiracy, ED stated on March 17, 2024.

The Special PMLA Court, New Delhi remanded her for ED custodial interrogation for 7 days till March 23, 2024, vide order dated March 16, 2024. A search was also conducted at the residence of Kavitha in Hyderabad on March 15, 2024. During the search proceedings, the ED claimed that its officials were obstructed by her relatives and associates.

Till March 17, 2024, the ED said it had conducted searches on 245 locations across the country including Delhi, Hyderabad, Chennai, Mumbai and other places.

Besides Kejriwal, 15 other persons including Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh and Vijay Nair from AAP have been arrested in the case so far.

Uptil Kejriwal’s arrest, ED had filed 1 Prosecution Complaint and 5 Supplementary Complaints in the case. It claimed that out of the Proceeds of Crime generated, assets worth Rs. 128.79 Crore had been traced so far and had been attached vide Provisional Attachment Orders dated January 24, 2023, and July 3, 2023, and both the attachment orders were confirmed by the Adjudicating Authority, New Delhi.

It may be mentioned that the AAP government introduced the liquor policy in Delhi in November 2021, under which the government withdrew from the retail sale of liquor and allowed private licensees to run stores. In July 2022, Delhi Chief Secretary Naresh Kumar alleged “undue benefits” to liquor licensees. Finally, the policy was scrapped in September 2022.