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Raghav Chadha alleged that BJP was responsible for creating and sending the summons. (File)

New Delhi:

Responding to the fresh summons issued by the Directorate of Enforcement (ED) to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Aam Aadmi Party MP Raghav Chadha on Thursday said, “The entire case is fake.”

He further added, “The entire conspiracy has been hatched just to trap the Aam Aadmi Party and Arvind Kejriwal.

“The entire case is fake, there is not a shred of evidence, neither the agencies have any evidence nor is there any crime in this matter. But the entire conspiracy has been hatched just to trap the Aam Aadmi Party and Arvind Kejriwal,” Raghav Chadha told ANI.

Arvind Kejriwal was summoned by the ED in relation to the Delhi excise policy case On December 21. However, he did not attend the summons issued by the Enforcement Directorate, the investigating agency

Further, the AAP MP questioned the timing of the summons, saying, “The summons was sent when CM Arvind Kejriwal had announced a week ago that he would go for Vipassana for 10 days. It was sent because their purpose is not to investigate but to implicate the CM and finish the Aam Aadmi Party.”

Further, Raghav Chadha claimed that the summons in question were not being issued by the concerned agency but rather by the BJP. He alleged that the BJP was responsible for creating and sending these summons.

“We feel that this summons is not being sent by the agency, this summons is being sent by the BJP. These summons are made and sent by the BJP itself, the whole issue is not legal, it is political, it is inspired by politics,” the AAP minister told ANI.

Responding to the fresh summons issued by the Directorate of Enforcement (ED), Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday, said that the summons sent to him are just to create sensational news in the final months of the parliamentary elections in 2024.

Questioning the timing of the summons, Arvind Kejriwal said, “The timing of your summons leaves much to desire and strengthens my belief that the summons being sent to me are not based upon any objective or rational yardstick but purely as propaganda as well as to create sensational news in the final few months of much-awaited parliamentary elections in the country.”

Arvind Kejriwal further questioned ED for not responding to his earlier questions. “You have chosen not to inform me nor provide me details of the case file corresponding to file number mentioned in your summons, the reasons for summoning me, or any details thereof. Your summons appears to be a fishing and roving inquiry,” said Arvind Kejriwal in a statement.

The Delhi Chief Minister also expressed his unawareness of being summoned under what capacity. He said it’s not clear that “I am being called as witness, suspect, as Delhi’s Chief Minister or as a convenor of Aam Adami Party.

Fellow AAP leader and Delhi Minister Atishi launched a scathing attack on the BJP-led Centre over the summons issued to the Chief Minister, saying that the BJP is “afraid” of AAP due to the latter’s increasing popularity across the nation.

“For the last two years, the ED and the CBI have been investigating the ‘so-called’ liquor scam. The centre got hundreds of raids conducted and employed thousands of officers in the case. But yet, they haven’t been able to recover a single penny from the AAP leaders,” Atishi told ANI.

“Why are summonses being sent to CM Kejriwal? This is because the BJP is afraid of the party’s increasing popularity across the country. The AAP is working in Punjab and Delhi. It has provided good governance in these states and the BJP has not been able to do so,” she added.

Arvind Kejriwal was earlier summoned by the CBI in April of this year in connection with the same case. However, the Chief Minister was not named as an accused in the FIR filed by the CBI on August 17 last year.

In February 2023, Arvind Kejriwal’s Deputy Manish Sisodia was arrested by the CBI for alleged irregularities in the framing and implementation of the now-scrapped Delhi’s new excise policy. The policy was withdrawn amid allegations of a crime by the opposition.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)