The Enforcement Directorate has informed that they have attached ₹52 crore worth of assets to former Delhi deputy chief minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Manish Sisodia his wife and some other accused in the Delhi excise policy-linked money laundering case.

The attached assets include two properties of the former Delhi deputy chief minister and his wife Seema Sisodia along with a bank balance of ₹11 lakh.

The development comes a day after Manish Sisodia moved Supreme Court for bail in CBI and ED cases related to alleged irregularities in the Delhi Excise Policy case.

According to the ED, a provisional order has been issued under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act to attach, among other things, immovable properties worth 7.29 crores, including two assets belonging to Manish Sisodia and his wife Seema Sisodia, land or a flat belonging to another accused, Rajesh Joshi (director of Chariot Productions Media Pvt Ltd.), and land or a flat belonging to Gautam Malhotra.

The attachment also includes movable assets worth ₹44.29 crore including bank balances of Manish Sisodia worth ₹11.49 lakh, Brindco Sales Pvt. Ltd. (amount of ₹16.45 crore), and others, the agency said in a statement.

The total attachment value is ₹52.24 crore, the ED said.

Businessmen Amandeep Singh Dhall, Gautam Malhotra, and Rajesh Joshi are among others whose assets have been attached.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on March 9 arrested former Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia in the liquor policy case, after hours of questioning at Tihar Jail. Sisodia, a former deputy chief minister of Delhi, was arrested by the ED in this case in March and he is currently in judicial custody.

The CBI previously detained Sisodia as part of an inquiry into suspected irregularities in the formulation and application of the National Capital Territory of Delhi's (GNCTD) excise policy.

ED and the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) alleged that the excise policy 2021-22 by the Delhi government that granted licenses for liquor trading enabled cartelization and favoured certain dealers who allegedly paid bribes for the process. AAP had strongly denied the charges.

Image source: Hindustan Times