ED raids attempt to silence Sanjay Singh's voice: Saurabh Bhardwaj

Aam Admi Party leader Saurabh Bhardwaj on Wednesday said AAP Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh is the Opposition's most powerful voice, and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) raids are an attempt to silence him.

He added that Singh never backed down from raising public issues to the Centre, and said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has realised that his government is about to be ousted from power in 2024, and has resorted to conducting bogus raids.

"They have slapped an imaginary and fictitious case and alleged that a scam worth hundreds of crores has taken place. I think this is the first scam in history into which an investigation has been going on for 15 months. Two of the biggest investigation agencies of the country, the CBI and ED, are conducting an investigation in this matter. They have raided over 1,000 places, including business people, politicians, business houses, and traders."

Lashing out at PM Modi, he said the Centre is taking such steps "out of desperation", to find something incriminating and build a case on it, and that the AAP strongly condemns such raids.

Despite the CBI-ED investigation and raids on thousands of places, they could not find anything, Bhardwaj said in a statement. "ED will not find anything from Sanjay Singh's residence, and yet plant fake news through sources that they have found something suspicious on phones and laptops."

People are hoping that the Lok Sabha elections are held at the earliest so that they can "bid adieu to the BJP", Bhardwaj added.

The ED arrested Sanjay Singh in connection with its probe into the money laundering case related to the now scrapped Delhi excise policy, officials said.

A top ED official told IANS that Singh has been put under arrest under the sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), but did not share details.

The arrest comes after agency sleuths on Wednesday carried out a search at Singh's residence in Delhi's North Avenue area.