Chhattisgarh liquor scam: ACB/EOW raids 13 premises including 2 ex-IAS officers’

Raipur: Chhattisgarh’s Economic Offence Wing (EOW)/Anti Corruption Bureau (ACB) on Sunday raided 13 premises, including that of two former IAS officers, an excise officer and a few businessmen, in connection with the alleged liquor scam unearthed during the previous Congress-led government in the state, a statement issued by the state government stated.
The action also covered the premises of a businessman in Greater Noida in Uttar Pradesh, the statement added.
“The raids covered the premises of former chief secretary Vivek Dhand (retired IAS officer), former secretary of commerce and industry department Anil Tuteja (retired IAS officer), then commissioner of excise department Niranjan Das, excise officer Ashok Kumar Singh, businessman Anwar Dhebar (brother of Congress leader and Raipur Mayor Aijaz Dhebar), Arvind Singh and Siddarth Singhania in Raipur,” the statement reads.
According to officials, in the first information report, lodged on January 18 based on the complaint of the Enforcement Directorate (ED), 70 persons, including several Congress leaders, and companies have been named.
The FIR was lodged under sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1988/Amended Act 2018 and the Indian Penal Code, they said.
The statement further reads that the raids covered the premises of the then special secretary of the excise department and managing director of Chhattisgarh State Marketing Corporation Limited – Arunpati Tripathi (Indian Telecom Service officer) in Durg district, then assistant commissioner of excise department Korba Saurabh Bakshi in Korba district, businessman Rajendra Jaiswal of M/s Welcome Distilleries and Bhupendra Pal Singh Bhatia of M/s Bhatia Wine Merchant in Bilaspur district and Naveen Kedia of M/s Chhattisgarh Distillery Limited in Kumhari area (Durg).
Besides, the raid was also launched at M/s Prism Hologram and Security Private Limited of Vidhu Gupta in Greater Noida, it said. The search in premises of these suspects is still underway, it added.
The ED in July last year submitted a charge sheet in the case claiming that Rs.776 crore of the Rs.2,161 crore collected in the Chhattisgarh liquor scam by Dhebar, the prime accused, went to “political executives”.
Dhebar had decided to replicate the same corruption model in Jharkhand as well, but “abruptly” stopped when the ED started looking into the irregularities, the ED alleged.
The ED, in its complaint to the ACB/EOW, had claimed criminal acts were committed by certain senior officials in connivance with private and influential persons for causing loss to the state government and earning illegal profits for themselves in the liquor trade.
Its probe revealed that a criminal syndicate was operating in Chhattisgarh, which was extorting illegal commission in the sale of liquor and was also involved in the unauthorised sale of unaccounted liquor through government liquor shops, said the ED.