The Rouse Avenue Court sent the arrested accused, Vinod Chauhan, to three days’ custody of the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) in connection with an alleged money laundering case linked to Delhi’s excise policy.
The ED made a recent apprehension in the case on Friday and took into custody a man identified as Vinod Chauhan. He was arrested by the ED for allegedly transferring a cash bribe amount from the South Group to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) during the campaign for the Goa Assembly Election.
On Saturday, Special Judge Kaveri Baweja, after considering the submissions, decided to remand Chauhan to ED custody until May 7, 2024. “Vinod Chauhan was arrested from Goa’s ED Zonal Office. He was involved in the transfer of the amount of Rs. 25.5 crores out of Rs. 45 crores, which was used in the AAP Goa elections,” ED stated.
Advocates Zoheb Hossain and Naveen Kumar Matta submitted that Chauhan was aware that the money was related to the Delhi liquor excise policy scam and was deeply involved with the key conspirators. He is primarily involved in Hawala transfers and cash movements and also acted as a middleman for bureaucrats and politicians, ED claimed.
During the hearing, Advocate Gagan Manocha represented Chauhan and opposed the ED’s remand petition. He stated that his client had cooperated with the probe and had already provided audit reports to the agency regarding the amount seized by the ED.
In the Excise case, both the CBI and ED alleged that irregularities were committed during the modification of the excise policy, unwarranted favors were extended to license holders, the license fee was waived or reduced, and the L-1 license was extended without the competent authority’s approval.
The probe agencies stated that the beneficiaries diverted “illegal” gains to the accused officials and made false entries in their account books to avoid detection. According to the allegations, the excise department had decided to refund the earnest money deposit of about Rs. 30 crore to a successful tenderer against the set rules.
Due to COVID-19, there was no enabled provision, and a waiver on tendered license fees was allowed from December 28, 2021, to January 27, 2022, the probe agency said, alleging an alleged loss of Rs. 144.36 crore to the exchequer.
