The Delhi Liquor Scam Endangering the Sovereignty

NewsBharati    01-Apr-2024 12:26:23 PM   
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Why was the Delhi Chief Minister arrested?

Is there a deeper expose behind Liquorgate?

How once, the messiah of the anti-corruption movement fall into the deep ditch of corruption?

The Shloka


सत्यं हि धर्मवृक्षस्य मुलं साखासहश्रीनः।

Meaning - Truth is the root of the Dharma tree with its thousand branches!

This shloka is from Bharata Manjari, Verse - 1-25-1119. Bharata Manjiri is the poem form of Mahabharata written by Ksemendra Adi.

Sanatan Sanskriti since time immemorial believed that TRUTH, the immortal truth - the truth that is beneficial for the last man standing, the truth that protects the weakest, the truth that enables changes in the conditions of the common man's household cannot be withheld, suppressed or quieted.

The truth spreads and thus the Dharma, the righteousness, the right path, the eternal truth with its thousand branches maintains the equilibrium, the equanimity and the piety of the Universal natural system.
 
ED liquor scam arvind kejriwal

Hence what happened on the fateful day of 21st March 2024, when the honourable chief minister of Delhi was taken into judicial custody of the Enforcement Directorate for 6 days till 28th March 2024 under the Liquorgate Scam was the reinenforcement of the same Dharma.

The Prologue, the Past, the Prelude


Allegations and counter-allegations in the Liquor Scam started in 2021 when the pre-existing Excise Policy of Delhi was altered.

Before Nov 17th 2021, the Liquor retail business in the Union Territory of Delhi was controlled by the Delhi government. In other words, the government shops retailed and sold the liquor in the City and had full control of the business.


The Promise


In Nov 2021, the Delhi Liquor Excise policy was amended with a noble view of curbing the Mafia in the Liquor business, stopping the black-marketing of liquor, increasing the revenues from the sale of Liquor for the government and having a better customer experience for the one who is coming to buy the liquor or consuming the alcohol and finally ensuring an equitable distribution of liquor through the city of Delhi.

The origin of the idea was sane, however, the intention dwindled. With the New Excise Policy, the distribution of Liquor was privatized. Unlike the previous policy, the new policy passed the baton of Liquor business from the city government to the private vendors. To execute it, the entire Delhi was divided into 32 zones and each zone was permitted to have 27 liquor shops.

Furthermore, licensed shop owners were given the flexibility to fix their MRPs (Maximum Retail Price) on the alcohol, as well as offer discounts as per their economics.

The Peril

Bars, Pubs within hotels, clubs, and restaurants in the National Capital Territory of Delhi were allowed to serve Indian as well as foreign liquor within their licensed premises including terraces or balconies as long as alcohol was being served away from the view of the general populace.

The policy allowed the promotion of microbreweries to supply draught beer to bars as well as allowed people of Delhi to fill their bottles with freshly brewed beer from any microbrewery in the city.

Earlier norms of alcohol retailing were revised ensuring that now bars, restaurants and shops were allowed to sell liquor till 3 am in the morning as against the earlier limitation of 10 pm. If this was not enough, a few establishments were issued licenses to sell alcohol round the clock.

Delhi in the past has seen serious night crime and safety challenges. However, the government focused on promoting its interests rather than the community's social interests.

The Fallout

FY 22 witnessed Delhi government revenues shooting up by 27% on account of heightened consumption of alcohol. Further, it led to the adulteration of liquor. The bottle seals were opened and adulterated with water and other spirits and then heavy discounts were given on the same.

As the sale of Liquor in the National Capital Region of Delhi was swinging up, the real intentions of the government and the ones associated with the Delhi government and the political people behind it were also unearthing.

Under the grab to improve the customer experience of the one who is drinking alcohol, the parallel phenomenon of greed, kickbacks, and misappropriation of funds was being hatched.

Within 8 months of the New Excise Policy, Delhi was abuzz with misdeeds of the new policy. Murmurs of huge irregularities started surfacing in the allocation of licenses, especially from the ones who were denied this golden opportunity. Resistance picked up momentum from various social bodies of society, as well as schools, colleges etc who found this policy to be hazardous for the future of the capital as it led to major distraught in the lower income families where significant sums of money were wasted on the consumption of alcohol.

Furthermore, the move from the Delhi government to allow the opening of liquor vends in wards having non-conforming areas, which were largely unauthorized colonies added fuel to the fire. Sensing upcoming furore the Delhi government rolled back the new policy in July 2022.

To everyone’s surprise, the new policy was rolled out, and implemented without the permission of the Lieutenant Governor of Delhi (LG), which made this implementation entirely illegal.

In addition to this, the wrong information regarding the requisite permissions was provided to the Delhi High Court in one of the hearings for which the Court reprimanded the Delhi Government for violating the GNCTD (Government of National Capital Territory of Delhi) Act 1991, Transaction of Business Rules (ToBR) 1993, Delhi Excise Act 2009 and Delhi Excise Rules 2010.

The Monetary Plot

In August 2022, LG after getting multiple complaints ordered a CBI probe in the case. CBI found an unholy nexus between license holders, their proxy owners, and sleeping partners in the businesses owning licenses, hidden investments, politicians, and ministers of the Delhi government involved in the swift and hasty execution of the new excise policy.

The CBI registered the case of criminal conspiracy and corruption and thus the Enforcement Directorate (ED) came into the picture.

The ED after a detailed investigation found that several cartels were formulated to facilitate the smooth execution of Delhi Excise Liquor Policy 21 -22 with the same set of people controlling, the manufacturing, wholesale, as well as retailing under various anonymous and disguised or proxy names with sleeping partners using their illicit money.

The ED findings established that the wholesale margins in the liquor business were increased from 5% to 12% with a clear objective of giving 6% out of 12% (meaning 50% of the earnings of the Wholesaler) to be passed on as kickback or bribe to the political party concerned. Even retailers' margins rose by 185% on liquor sales, to facilitate the diversion of additional profits to the political party.

The ED searched 245 locations since 2022, arrested 16 people, filed six chargesheets, and attached assets worth over INR 128 Crores.

ED estimated that the loss to the Delhi exchequer at ~ 540 Crores on account of the new policy in a matter of 8 -9 months.

ED has proof that key people in the political party and Delhi CM and Deputy CM received over INR 100 Crores in bribes and kickbacks and a large part of this money was utilised to fight the Punjab elections.

ED also established that INR 45 Crores were received by the political party to fight the Goa elections from the beneficiaries of the New Excise Policy in Delhi.

It's estimated that by paying these sums, the group which benefitted from the change in liquor policy made an unholy profit of INR 600 crores, as reported by ED to the court.

After this Deputy CM of Delhi who was also the Excise Minister of Delhi then, at the time of implementation of the New excise policy was arrested in 2023.

ED post then has been following up for answers from the Delhi Chief Minister and sent nine summons between October 2023 and March 2024, but the Delhi CM did not cooperate with the investigation and remained elusive. Finally, he was arrested in March 2024, the first chief minister to be arrested while in office.

The Conundrum

It also comes as a surprise that on 22nd March 2024, the next day after the arrest, the Delhi chief minister urged the Honourable Supreme Court to hear the case against the arrest and then suddenly withdrew the case from the top court, once the court decided to reconvene the Special bench for the Chief Minister. Also, the arrest came in when the Delhi High Court rejected the anticipatory bail, refusing to give protection from the arrest.

The Snooping Side

In 2023, 8-9 months before the arrest of the Chief Minister, the CBI accused the Party leadership of snooping its very own ministers, ministries, bureaucrats, their families and rivals. The leadership of the political party in consideration was gathering political intelligence against its own people and people at high-level ranks through the centre, judiciary and bureaucracy.

It’s shocking that, the ED has found some documents that indicate some of ED's own officials were being snooped by the Delhi CM and his people.

The Khalistani Angle

In one of the media clippings, Khalistani terrorist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun claimed that the political party from which the Delhi CM belongs has received USD 16 million from Khalistani terrorist groups and their supporters between 2014 to 2022. Pannun has also claimed that the Delhi CM proposed releasing the convicted terrorist in the Delhi Bomb Blast case - Devinder Pal Singh Bhullar, in return for financial support.

In January 2024, Pannum accused the Delhi CM and Punjab CM of accepting USD 6 million in donations from Khalistan supporters in the US and Canada.

Media reports and various documents suggest that Khalistani terrorist Gurpatwant Singh Pannun is very close to senior officials of the CIA and they see him as an important asset to manage activities in the Indian Subcontinent region.

The Unholy Past

Before one jumps to a conclusion, it’s important to delve into the past of the Delhi Chief Minister. In 1999 the Delhi CM who was still in service of Income tax founded a Social organization or a movement called “Parivartan” along with the ex-Deputy CM of Delhi who was then working as a News Reporter.

Since then the Deep State identified these two and decided to invest in these assets against Bharat.

By 2000, the present Delhi Chief Minister took a sabbatical from the Income Tax department and started focusing on the work of the Parivartan. The duo unearthed many scams in Delhi then under the administration of the Grand Old Party regime. Predominantly PDS (Public Distribution System) Scam in which ration shop dealers siphoned off food grains in collusion with civic officials.

The same party is today responsible for the entire episode that is unfolding in front of the Delhi CM as the Delhi Pradesh Chief of the Grand Old Party of India filed a complaint letter to the Delhi Police in June 2022 after which the proceedings and events started to shape for the present CM.

Circling back in 2006, Parivartan was awarded the Ramon Magsaysay Award, that has been established by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, which is a philanthropic foundation created and run by members of the Rockefeller family.

Many Western media have accused rich philanthropies like the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Rockefeller Foundation, and Gates Foundation of pushing their own agenda in underdeveloped and developing nations to ensure their economic interests remain intact, irrespective of the progress of the nation in consideration. The poorer the country becomes, the more influence these rich philanthropies have on the country.

In 2005, the Delhi CM and the ex-deputy CM of Delhi created another social organization known as Kabir that was focused on RTI (Right to Information) and participatory governance. The social organization "Kabir" was funded by the Ford Foundation from day one when there was not even a single project that existed.

The Delhi CM has admitted in the past that his NGO took money From the Ford Foundation that is closely linked and associated with the CIA. Steven Solnick – Ford Foundation’s representative in India confirmed that grants of USD 15 million were given by the foundation to Delhi CM’s NGO.

The most amusing part is that prominent funding for the “War against Corruption” campaign that shook Bharat in 2013 came from abroad and mainly from the United States.

The ulterior Ultimate Motive and the man behind

It’s intriguing to note that in Aug 2023, an organization known as OCCRP (Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project) declared that they were planning another expose of a certain big corporate house in Bharat, after the Hindenberg attack so that the financial stability of the Nation can be pierced. OCCRP was funded by George Soros, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, Ford Foundation, Oak Foundation and others.

A few lines about the billionaire George Soros. He is the same man, who through his Social Organisation called Open Society Foundations popularly called agents of disruption has played a key role in purported plots to topple Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government, tried to destabilize Europe through mass migrations and even funded the Arab Springs Mass movements amongst many other notorious activities. Mr. Soros is accredited to be the major influence for causing the 1997 Asian crisis that led to the collapse of major economies in East Asia and South East Asia.

With this, backdrop Delhi Liquorgate is just the tip of the iceberg and there are more questions than answers, that the country needs to ask -

1. Why were Delhi CM and Ex-Deputy Delhi CM funded by Deep State when the Grand Old Party was at the Centre as well as in Delhi State?

2. Why did the Grand Old Party which is in alliance with the Delhi CM’s party make complaints against the wrongs of the party of the Delhi Chief Minister?

3. Why did the Delhi CM snooped its own team members and senior officers of ED?

4. What was promised by the Delhi CM and his team to Khalistanis in return for funds?

5. Is the Delhi Liquorgate just related to Delhi Alchohol or it is a deeper conspiracy to shake up the roots of Bharat?
The drama and Dharma both will unfold in the next few weeks and months.



Siddhartha Rastogi

Siddhartha Rastogi is Managing Director & Chief Operating Officer of a Leading Full Service Investment Bank. Views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official view or position of any company or sister concerns or group company where the author is presently employed.