Bhupesh Baghel's son got ₹250-crore share from liquor fraud case: Charge sheet

CHaitanya, boy of former Chhattisgarh chief government minister Bhupesh Baghel, received ₹200 crore to ₹250 crore as his deal from an alleged hard liquor cozenage in the state, the Anti- Corruption Bureau/Economic Offence Wing (ACB/EOW) claimed in its chargesheet.The state police’s ACB/EOW, in its seventh supplementary chargesheet in the multi-crore liquor scam filed before a special court here on Monday, claimed Chaitanya Baghel played a key role in establishing, coordinating, and protecting extortion racket (syndicate) within the excise department (during the previous Congress government which was in office from 2018-23).The document, which runs into around 3,800 pages, has named Chaitnaya Baghel as an accused in the alleged scam pegged at more than ₹3,000 crore, an ACB/EOW statement said. With this, a total of eight chargesheets have been filed in the case so far.The latest chargesheet details the current status of probe against the accused already arrested, along with digital evidence reports pertaining to all those in custody.The statement quoting the chargesheet said Chaitanya acted as coordinator among officials such as Anil Tuteja, Soumya Chaurasia, Arunpati Tripathi, and Niranjan Das who worked in line with the syndicate’s interests at administrative level and as ground-level operatives of the network such as Anwar Dhebar, Arvind Singh, and Vikas Agarwal (all co-accused), and issued instructions to them.Chaitanya worked through his trusted associates to transfer and manage proceeds of the scam collected by businessman Anwar Dhebar’s team, moving the funds to higher levels, it claimed. “Evidence indicates that Chaitanya, along with managing the proceeds of crime at a higher level, received around ₹200 crore- ₹250 crore as his share,” agency said.The probe also revealed that high-level protection, policy/administrative intervention, and influence provided to the syndicate by Chaitanya enabled this crime to be perpetrated, it claimed. “The ongoing investigation suggests the amount involved in the liquor scam is estimated to be approximately ₹3,074 crore... Further investigation suggests the total amount of the proceeds of crime generated out of the alleged scam could exceed ₹3,500 crore.”BJP president JP Nadda on Monday alleged that some insiders in the Congress were involved in facilitating the 2013 Jhiram Ghati Naxal attack, which led to the killing of state Congress leaders. “I witnessed (developments related to) Jhiram Valley incident. Today, I want to say with great responsibility that no one else was providing information and inside details about the Jhiram Valley incident; it was people from within their own ranks who were involved in getting their own people killed and were in contact with Naxalites.”Hitting back, Bhupesh said: “...Today, the BJP’s national president has once again insulted the martyrs who lost their lives in the Jhiram incident. First of all, security agencies, including the NIA, should question JP Nadda and demand proof of his claims.”“JP Nadda ji ! We lost our leaders in the Naxal attack. By making allegations of collusion, you are insulting their martyrdom.”(With agency inputs)