A Delhi Court on Saturday remanded BRS leader K Kavitha in custody to the Enforcement Directorate (ED) until March 23. The arrest is linked to a money laundering investigation related to the Delhi liquor policy case.
Special judge MK Nagpal from Rouse Avenue Court made the decision after Kavitha, daughter of former Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao, was brought to court by the central probe agency following her arrest and sought custody for 10 days, Live Law reported.
Kavitha, who serves as a member of the Telangana Legislative Council, was arrested by the central probe agency at 5:20pm from her home in Banjara Hills, Hyderabad, on Friday.
Earlier today, Kavitha denied all allegations, describing her arrest in the liquor policy scam case as ‘illegal.’ The BRS MLC stated that it is ‘a fabricated case.’
“The arrest is illegal. We will fight it in court,” said K Kavitha as she was brought into the courtroom.
Senior Advocate Vikram Chaudhary, representing Kavitha, made initial statements against the arrest, stating that it is a “clear abuse of power and authority.”
He claimed that the ED went back on its statement made orally to the Supreme Court last September. According to ED’s assurance, the central probe agency agreed not to summon Kavitha “until the next date of hearing” in her plea against summons.
“Your entire action is wrong. It is a vexatious arrest,” Chaudhary argued, while highlighting the ED had withdrawn its oral undertaking which was not recorded in the Supreme Court’s order.
“An undertaking given to the court which is not explicitly recorded because we believe that status of each of us counsels are par higher and statement is good enough. This undertaking was withdrawn,” Chaudhary added.
On Friday, both the ED and the Income Tax department conducted searches at Kavitha’s residence in Hyderabad. Previously, both departments had sent notices to Kavitha, asking her to appear and provide a statement. However, she appealed to the Supreme Court against these notices and refused to comply.
According to the ED’s chargesheet, Kavitha was allegedly involved in a ‘South Group’ that paid Rs 100 crore in kickbacks to leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in exchange for undue benefits under the now-cancelled Delhi excise policy. Kavitha has denied these allegations and referred to the ED notices as “Modi notices”.
Notably, three prominent AAP leaders – Manish Sisodia, Sanjay Singh, and Vijay Nair – are already in jail in connection with this case.
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