By Atul Krishan

New Delhi, May 1 (IANS): Delhi's former Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia in a bid to cover the conspiracy in the excise policy scam allegedly planted emails, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has claimed in the third supplementary chargesheet, sources told IANS.

"To cover the conspiracy and to provide legitimacy to their hidden agenda, Manish Sisodia even went to the extent of planting mails which furthered his agenda and the changes he wanted to make in the policy which reflects his malafide intention," the ED has claimed.

The ED said that its PMLA investigation so far has revealed that the Delhi Excise Policy, 2021-22 was brought by the leadership of the AAP, specifically by Manish Sisodia, to continuously generate and channel illegal funds to themselves.

The ED had mentioned in it's previous chargesheet that the excise policy was formulated with deliberate loopholes to facilitate illegal and criminal activities.

The policy promoted cartel formations through the backdoor, awarded exorbitant wholesale (12%) and a huge retail profit margin of 185% and incentivized other illegal activities on account of a criminal conspiracy by Manish Sisodia and other leaders of the AAP to extract kickbacks from the liquor businesses.

The Excise Policy 2021-22 was formulated in secrecy and in connivance with the major beneficiaries. The substantive provisions of the policy were made without any deliberation, either with the GoM or with the excise department.

Calling for comments and suggestions from the public was only an eyewash.

"The conspiracy of the GoM to give the wholesale business to private entities and fix a 12% margin (to get 6% kickback from it) is clear from the statement of C. Arvind wherein he disclosed that there was no discussion in the GoM meetings about giving wholesale to private," the ED has mentioned in the chargesheets.