ED could file case on how AAP leaders are breathing: Atishi

AAP on Friday, 5 July lashed out at the Enforcement Directorate saying "the agency could file a case on how the party's leaders are breathing".

These remarks came after the ED on Friday said it seized Rs 41 lakh in cash, "incriminating" documents and digital devices during searches conducted as part of a money laundering case linked to alleged corruption in the augmentation of some sewage treatment plants (STPs) by the Delhi Jal Board (DJB).

The raids were launched on 3 July and covered multiple places in Delhi, Ahmedabad, Mumbai and Hyderabad, the probe agency said in a statement.

"What the Enforcement Directorate (ED) does, against whom it works, on whose orders it works, is well known. In this country, everyone has seen the ‘washing machine' of the Bharatiya Janata Party, how it works on Ajit Pawar and his entire family when they join the BJP, whether it is a sugar cooperative case or an irrigation scam case, the ED files a closure report in it," Delhi Minister Atishi said in a statement.

The money laundering investigation stems from an FIR of the Delhi government's anti-corruption branch (ACB) against a company named Euroteck Environmental Pvt Ltd and others alleging a scam in the DJB in the name of augmentation and upgradation of 10 STPs at Pappankala, Nilothi (Package 1), Najafgarh, Keshopur (Package 2), Coronation Pillar, Narela, Rohini (Package 3) and Kondli (Package 4).

These four tenders, valued at Rs 1,943 crore, were awarded to various joint venture (JV) entities in October, 2022.

"When Himanta Biswa Sarma became the CM of the BJP, the ED closed the ‘Hydro Power Scam’ case against him.

"They have been investigating the ‘liquor scam’ for two years, they did not find anything; they were investigating the construction of classrooms, they did not find anything there; they are investigating mohalla clinics, they did not find anything there," she claimed.

Atishi said the party "has been opposing the dictatorship of the BJP" and will continue to oppose it.

"The ED has only registered a case in the Delhi Jal Board, now the Health Department, Education Department, Flood Department are still left. If there is a department for breathing, then ED can file a case on how the AAP members are breathing," she charged.