AAP MLA liquor case: court gives protection to man from arrest

A Delhi court today granted protection from arrest till May 30 to a man accused in a case in which around 8,500 bottles of illicit liquor were seized from a godown before the assembly elections here.
The court granted the temporary relief to one Sanjay Verma who has moved an anticipatory bail plea in the court.
Additional Sessions Judge Mukesh Kumar Gupta issued a notice to the Crime Branch of Delhi Police and sought its response on May 30 on the plea.
The court said that Verma should not be arrested till May 30 and also directed him join the investigation and cooperate with the police.

The police had earlier said there were indications that the large quantity of liquor seized from the warehouse at Uttam Nagar belonged to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) MLA Naresh Balyan.
Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime) Ravindra Yadav had said the investigation had revealed that the plot in Uttam Nagar, where the cartons were stored, belonged to Balyan's cousin but "he uses the godown and the liquor belonged to him, so we served him a notice".

An FIR was registered in the case against unnamed persons.
AAP had maintained that Balyan had got nothing to do with the recovered liquor and said these are all old tactics of the opposition to defame the party.

On January 31, Delhi Police had registered a case under Excise Act on recovering around 8,500 bottles with the label "for sale in Haryana only".
During the raid, 397 cartons of India Made Foreign Liquor were seized by police and election commission officials and police had said the liquor was meant for distribution during the Delhi assembly elections.