The CBI has arrested a Hyderabad-based chartered accountant (CA), understood to be the auditor of BRS MLC K Kavitha, in connection with the Delhi excise policy case, officials said on Wednesday
The Central Bureau of Investigation had called the CA, Butchibabu Gorantla, to Delhi for questioning in connection with the excise policy case. He was arrested on Tuesday evening as he was non-cooperative and his responses were found to be evasive, they said.
The CBI has alleged that Gorantla's role in the formulation and implementation of the now-scrapped Delhi Excise Policy 2021-22 caused "wrongful gain" to Hyderabad-based wholesale and retail licensees and their beneficial owners.
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The agency will produce him before a special court here on Wednesday.
The CBI had questioned Kavitha, the daughter of Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, in connection with the case in December last year.
The 'South Group' connection
Previoulsy, Enforcement Directorate (ED), the federal agency with the responsibility to probe financial crimes, had alleged that K Kavitha was associated with the "South Cartel" that benefited from kickbacks in the liquor policy case.
AAP government had withdrawn the policy last year after the capital's Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena, ordered a CBI probe.
The Enforcement Directorate and the CBI have pointed towards irregularities while modifying Delhi's excise policy with connivance and kickbacks from a lobby known as the "South Group" which 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.
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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.
(With PTI Inputs)
