Raipur- The Enforcement Directorate has filed the final charge sheet in the much-talked-about liquor scam case of Chhattisgarh. After this, the sword of arrest is once again hanging over the 29 excise officers who had got bail from the Supreme Court. In its final charge sheet, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) has named tantrik KK Srivastava, a close associate of former Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel, and businessman Laxminarayan Bansal alias Pappu as accused along with these officers.

In the final charge sheet, the ED has alleged that 29 officers of the Excise Department committed a scam of about Rs 90 crore. Apart from this, arbitrary commission was collected from big liquor businessmen. The investigating agency claims that this entire network was also used for election funding.

According to the chargesheet, KK Srivastava and Pappu Bansal, along with 29 excise officials, collected election funds. However, the ED and EOW have not yet arrested Pappu Bansal. KK Srivastava is already in jail, while Pappu Bansal is freely at large.

The ED has alleged that Chaitanya Baghel and Yash Tuteja played a key role in the syndicate formed for the liquor scam. The investigation also revealed that fake holograms were used extensively. 4,014 boxes of duplicate holograms were sent to Raipur from the Prism Hologram Factory in Noida, which were used for the illegal sale of liquor. According to the ED

's charge sheet,
a significant portion of the scam proceeds went to party funds. It is alleged that ₹1,500 crore was used as party funds. Furthermore, Soumya Chaurasia received ₹115 crore, Anwar Dhebar ₹90 crore, Kawasi Lakhma ₹72 crore, Arunpati Tripathi ₹55 crore, Niranjan Das ₹18 crore, and Anil Tuteja ₹14 crore.

Excise officers became a source of election funding.
Investigating agencies claim that large-scale funding was provided to a political party through the Excise Department for the 2023 Assembly elections. The responsibility of collecting the money was assigned to Excise Deputy Commissioners Dinkar Vasnik, Naveen Pratap Singh Tomar, Vikas Goswami, Neetu Notani, and Iqbal Khan. It is alleged that these officers secured postings for officers of their choice in districts before the elections and made illegal collections for election funds. Liquor was also made available for distribution during the elections. According to the

Enforcement
Directorate (ED), the 15 districts identified for the liquor scam were divided into eight zones. Distilleries were assigned the supply task based on the zones. Illegal liquor was openly sold in Raipur, Bilaspur, Rajnandgaon, Raigarh, Mungeli, Mahasamund, Korba, Kawardha, Janjgir-Champa, Gariaband, Durg, Dhamtari, Bemetara, Balodabazar, and Balod. The 29 officers posted in these districts collected money per box, earning them approximately ₹90 crore in commissions.

After the ED chargesheet, there are indications that action in this case will once again intensify and the problems of the officers who are out on bail may increase.