Here's how corporate rivalry may have exposed alleged liquor scam

New Delhi: Was the corporate rivalry between two liquor manufacturers led to the unravelling of Delhi’s now infamous excise policy which has now resulted in the arrest of the city state’s deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia?

The CBI’s first chargesheet in the alleged liquor scam case drops a big hint in this regard.

According to the chargesheet, Sameer Mahandru, one of the accused, had formed a cartel through his entities - Khao Gali and Indo Spirit Marketing Private Limited which was in violation of the Excise Policy 2021- 22.

The chargesheet alleged that the excise officials granted L1 (distribution) license to Indo Spirits “without properly processing the file and collecting the requisite documents as well as without properly addressing the complaint against M/s Indo Spirits in lieu of Rs 30 lakh bribe” taken by an excise official Narender Singh from Sameer Mahandru and on the influence exerted by Vijay Nair and Dinesh Arora.

Then the chargesheet drops the big hint about corporate rivalry by disclosing that an accused and representative of people now being referred to as the “South Group”, Abhishek Boinpally, had threatened Jagbir Sidhu of liquor major Diageo to withdraw various complaints or petitions filed anonymously and pseudonymously who he believed to have been filed by Aman Dhall of Brindco, who was the wholesaler for Diageo.

So it seems that there were complaints with regard to the implementation of the excise policy and it led to a company official getting threatened too to get the complaints withdrawn.

According to the chargesheet, Boinpally threatened that he would get Diageo blacklisted from the nine retail zones he was managing or was a part of. And, he will get the wholesale license of his wholesale distributor Brindco cancelled by the Excise Department.

Indo Spirits of Mahandru was a wholesaler of another liquor major Pernod Ricard.

The CBI’s first chargesheet covered six accused persons - Sameer Mahandru, Vijay Nair, Abhishek Boinpally, Gautam Mootha, Arun Pillai and Excise officials - Kuldeep Singh and Narinder Singh.

The agency alleged that under a conspiracy, wholesale distribution of Pernod Ricard and Diageo went to Indo Spirits and Brindco, respectively.

The agency alleged that Vijay Nair instructed the employees of Pernod Ricard India through messages and conversations over the phone as well as in person that the company should not give its wholesale distributorship to Brindco as It was Diageo that will award its wholesale distributorship to Brindco.