Delhi excise policy case: ED arrests Delhi businessman Sameer Mahendru

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Wednesday arrested Sameer Mahendru, managing director of Jor Bagh based liquor distributor Indospirit Group in its money laundering probe in the Delhi’s excise policy 2021-22, people familiar with the development said.

Mahendru is named as a key accused in the excise policy scam, in which Delhi’s deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia is named.

The businessman had allegedly made two payments - ₹1crore to Dinesh Arora, a close aide of Sisodia, and a payment of somewhere between ₹2-4crore to Gurugram based alleged conduit Arjun Pandey on behalf of another accused Vijay Nair.

Nair was arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) on Tuesday evening.

Both the ED and the CBI are investigating alleged cartelization in the now-scrapped liquor policy, which allegedly benefitted some major liquor wholesalers/distributors and retailers while knocking out the smaller vendors from the tendering process.

Mahendru’s Indospirit got the L1 wholesale licence in the excise policy and investigations are on that the company also formed association with other companies to get retail licences, which was in violation of the rules of the policy.