Kejriwal's nephew arrested in PWD scam; AAP rejects charges

The Anti-Corruption Branch on Thursday arrested Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's nephew Vinay Bansal in an alleged PWD scam, sparking an angry reaction from the AAP which said it was part of the BJP's vendetta politics.

Vinay Bansal, the son of Kejriwal's late brother-in-law Surender Bansal, was a partner in a firm which was involved in the alleged scam worth over Rs 6 crore.

"We have arrested Vinay Bansal from his residence in Pitampura after he failed to give satisfactory replies to our queries about a firm - 'Mahadeo Impacts'," Special Commissioner of Police Arvind Deep told IANS.

The firm showed purchase of raw materials for the construction of a Public Works Department (PWD) drain.

"The ACB registered an FIR on May 8, 2017. We received a complaint that Surender Bansal got a tender below 46 per cent on behalf of a company, Renu Construction, on the estimated cost of Rs 4.9 lakh," Deep, who heads the ACB, said.

"The complaint also mentioned that the quality of products was not up to the mark. During the probe, it was found that iron and cement were bought from Mahadeo Impacts which was later found to be non-existent," he said.

Delhi Deputy Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Manish Sisodia told the media here that for the last three years, the Delhi Police and the ACB are being used by the Lt Governor and the Central government for arresting AAP leaders.

The Delhi Police is "planning just one thing: How to make AAP people unhappy", he said.

Bansal was doing projects with the Delhi government even before the Kejriwal government. The current case is on a contract he won before the AAP government came to power, he added.

"This is part of the chain of arrests against AAP MLAs," Sisodia said, adding this will be exposed in the court.

"The good thing is that there's justice in this country and when cases go to court it goes against police and police is being asked why did you do it?"

Sisodia said IIT Roorkee had done a third party audit as per the terms of the project and submitted a report and the PWD had also said that the work was done well.

"After the complaint, the ACB got a separate inquiry conducted by Sri Ram Labs which also said that work was satisfactory," Sisodia said.

AAP chief spokesperson Saurabh Bharadwaj rejected any corruption in the matter.

"There can be only two ways of corruption in PWD drain construction: the tender was rigged to favour of Chief Minister's relative or the payment was made for sub-standard work or incomplete work. In this case, nothing of this sort happened," he tweeted.

In May 2017, AAP rebel leader Kapil Mishra raised the issue following a whistleblower's revelations.

Surender Bansal, who ran a company that worked with the PWD for many years, died the same day Mishra raised the issue and filed the complaint.

--IANS

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