Delhi excise scam: BJP stages protest; demands Kejriwal's resignation

New Delhi: Delhi BJP leaders and workers on Saturday staged a protest at the AAP office here demanding the resignation of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal after the Enforcement Directorate named him in a charge sheet in the Delhi excise scam case.

Leader of Opposition in Delhi Assembly, Ramvir Singh Bidhuri alleged the AAP government was "looting" the city that was first looted by invaders like Mohammed Ghori, Mahmood Ghazni and Taimur, the British and thereafter by Congress governments.

"The Enforcement Directorate has named Kejriwal in its charge sheet related to the liquor scam and he should resign from the post of chief minister of Delhi," state BJP president Virendra Sachdeva said. No immediate reaction was available from the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) to the allegations. Several BJP workers were detained by police while trying to cross a barricade erected near the AAP office at DDU Marg.

The BJP will keep on exposing the "corruption" of the Kejriwal government which is weakening Delhi like a "termite", Sachdeva said during the protest.

The ED has claimed in its supplementary charge sheet filed in the court that a part of the alleged Rs 100 crore "kickbacks" generated in the scrapped Delhi excise policy was used in the AAP's 2022 Goa assembly election campaign.

It has also claimed that a close aide of the Delhi chief minister arranged a video call through FaceTime (a video calling facility on iPhone) on his phone for one of the accused Sameer Mahandru.

In the call, Kejriwal told Mahandru that the aide is "his boy" and he should trust him and carry on with him, the ED has claimed.

Kejriwal has dismissed the ED charge sheet, alleging that cases filed by the agency are "fake" and are used to "topple" governments and buy MLAs at the behest of the Centre.

Thousands of BJP workers participated in the protest, the Delhi BJP claimed in a statement.

Sachdeva said all the accused in the "liquor scam" are going to jail one by one and now the day is not far when Kejriwal and his deputy Manish Sisodia will also be behind the bars.

Bidhuri said the city government itself accepted in the Vidhan Sabha that there was loss of revenue due to the new liquor policy.

"Development has come to a standstill in Delhi and corruption is rampant everywhere," he alleged.

Delhi BJP general secretary Kuljit Singh Chahal said people of Delhi are not able to understand whether there is a "scam" in the AAP government or the government itself is a "scam".  BJP workers will no longer sit peacefully and will expose the corrupt ways of the Kejriwal government in Delhi, he said.