NEW DELHI, Apr 16: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal was questioned for nearly nine hours by the CBI today in the excise policy case, amid protests by his party as the AAP chief claimed that the allegations of scam were false and the agency was acting at the BJP’s behest.
“I was asked around 56 questions. I answered them all …As I said earlier we have nothing to hide. The alleged liquor scam is false, fabricated and motivated by dirty politics… We will die but not give up honesty,” Kejriwal told reporters after leaving the CBI headquarters at around 8.30 pm.
The agency had summoned Kejriwal on Friday last seeking his appearance as a witness before the investigation team.
In a video message this morning, the Aam Aadmi Party chief, who received solidarity messages from several opposition leaders after being summoned by the agency, claimed that the BJP might have ordered the CBI to arrest him.
The BJP, which has alleged that Kejriwal was the “kingpin”, said it was not the time for rhetoric but accountability and demanded his resignation.
BJP national spokesperson Sambit Patra said on Sunday that investigation agencies such as CBI and ED work on the basis of facts, not emotions.
Officials said the CBI asked the chief minister about the policy formulation process, especially the “untraceable” file, which was earlier slated to be put before the Council of Ministers.
They said the file containing opinions of the expert committee and public and legal opinions on it was not kept before the council and remains untraceable.
Kejriwal was also asked if he was involved in the formulation of the policy before it was approved, they said.
It is alleged that the Delhi government’s excise policy for 2021-22 to grant licences to liquor traders favoured certain dealers who had allegedly paid bribes for it, a charge strongly refuted by the AAP. The policy was later scrapped.
Kejriwal visited Mahatma Gandhi’s memorial at Raj Ghat this morning and was accompanied by Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and some cabinet colleagues to the CBI office.
While he was being questioned, several senior AAP leaders were “detained” by the Delhi Police during a sit-in at Archbishop Road against his summoning.
The detainees included Rajya Sabha MPs Sanjay Singh and Raghav Chadha, Delhi ministers Saurabh Bharadwaj, Atishi and Kailash Gahlot, AAP spokesperson Adil Ahmad Khan, AAP general secretary Pankaj Gupta and some ministers in the Punjab government.
“The Delhi Police has arrested us for sitting peacefully and is taking us to some unknown place… What kind of dictatorship is this?” Chadha tweeted.
“BJP suffers from chronic Kejriwal-phobia,” he alleged.
Mann, who also joined the sit-in, had left the spot before the AAP leaders’ detention.
“Around 1,500 people have been detained or arrested by police across Delhi for staging protests. Thirty-two Delhi MLAs and 70 councillors have been arrested in the city and 20 Punjab AAP MLAs have been arrested at the Delhi border,” AAP Delhi convener Gopal Rai claimed at a press conference.
Rai also chaired an “emergency meeting” of its office-bearers to decide the party’s next course of action.
The AAP chief was taken to the first-floor office of the Anti-Corruption Branch of the CBI, which is probing the matter, after arriving at the heavily fortified agency headquarters at around 11 pm.
Sources said Kejriwal was questioned for nearly nine hours. He was offered a lunch break and he chose not to go outside the CBI office.
Senior officials of the agency remained present in the office on Sunday to keep an eye on the development, a normal course whenever a VIP comes to the agency, the sources said.
The agency also quizzed Kejriwal on the statements of other accused, where they have indicated the manner in which policy was allegedly influenced to favour some liquor businessmen and the South liquor lobby.
In addition, the officials said the agency sought to know his role in formulating the excise policy and his knowledge about the alleged influence being cast by the traders and South lobby members.(PTI)
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