A Telangana-based chartered accountant, formerly employed with KCR’s daughter K Kavitha, was summoned to the national capital and arrested by the CBI in the Delhi liquor policy case.
Butchi Babu, K Kavitha’s ex auditor, represented the “South Group” in the case, said the CBI. He was arrested on Tuesday evening as he was non-cooperative and his responses were found to be evasive, said the agency.
The CBI has alleged that Mr Babu’s role in the formulation and implementation of the now-scrapped Delhi Excise Policy caused “wrongful gain” to Hyderabad-based wholesale and retail licensees and their beneficial owners.
Earlier, K Kavitha was questioned by a CBI team in Hyderabad on December 12 for over seven hours in connection with the case.
The Enforcement Directorate, which probes financial crimes, had alleged that K Kavitha was part of the “South Cartel” that benefited from kickbacks in the liquor policy case.
The policy was withdrawn last year by the AAP government after a CBI probe was ordered by the capital’s Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena, a representative of the BJP-led government at the centre.
The Enforcement Directorate and the CBI have claimed that irregularities were committed while modifying Delhi’s excise policy with connivance and kickbacks from a lobby known as the “South Group”.
The group comprised Kavitha of Telangana’s ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi, Magunta Srinivasalu Reddy, an MP from Andhra Pradesh’s ruling YSR Congress, and Sarath Reddy of Aurobindo Pharma, the agency has alleged.
Under it, the licence fee was waived or reduced, and undue favours were extended to liquor licence holders, the agencies have claimed.
Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia has been named as an accused and questioned in the case.
