Two held over ₹2cr ‘donation’ to AAP ahead of 2014 poll
nNEW DELHI: Delhi Police’s Economic Offences Wing (EOW) on Friday arrested two men for allegedly using “fabricated documents and photographs” to form four “shell companies” used to make a donation of Rs 2 crore to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in the run-up to the 2014 Delhi assembly elections.
The AAP said it is continuing to cooperate with the agencies in their probe and nothing “amiss” has been found against the party.
OP Mishra, joint commissioner of police (EOW), said the money trail followed by police revealed the funds for the donation were generated from the account of a company named M/S Antara Purukul Senior Living Limited. “It is a subsidiary company of Max Group,” Mishra said.
The Max Group, which works in real estate and senior living, said it was dragged into the investigation needlessly, and that it had no long-term association with the two people arrested, who merely did some work for it and were duly paid.
The arrested men are Mukesh Kumar and his “employee” Sudhanshu Bansal. “Bansal is a chartered accountant . Kumar is an accommodation entry operator and the mind behind all the four companies,” Mishra said. They were arrested for cheating, forgery, and criminal conspiracy.
Police did not specify whether AAP knew about these companies, or if it had any knowledge of any problems with the donation.
“AAP is committed to honest and transparent politics and has changed the political discourse in India in the last eight years of its existence. AAP will never compromise on its integrity. This is a six-year-old case, which has been investigated by almost all agencies. So far, nothing amiss has been found against AAP by any of the agencies. AAP has cooperated with all agencies and will continue to cooperate with them,” a party spokesperson said.
The controversy first erupted in 2015, when the AAP Volunteer Action Manch, a breakaway faction of AAP led by Karn Singh, alleged the donations were hawala transactions that were accepted by the party. AAP dismissed the allegations.