Liquor Scam: CAG Reports Expected to be Tabled in Delhi Assembly on Feb 27

The newly formed 70-member Delhi Assembly will meet for the first time on February 24, when the Speaker will be chosen. The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) reports are also to be laid before the House on February 27, said a senior BJP leader on Friday.

Three-term legislator and three-term councillor Vijender Gupta, a veteran politician, has been selected by the BJP as its Speaker candidate. He made public that in its first meeting on Thursday, the Delhi Cabinet sanctioned a proposal for a three-day Assembly session, to be held on February 24, 25, and 27.

Gupta stated that the CAG reports, including the report pointing to irregularities in the now-withdrawn excise policy, were already with the outgoing Speaker's office. Therefore, these will be among the very first things to be dealt with in the newly formed Assembly. He also hinted that the first session would involve mainly procedural matters like electing a Speaker and swearing-in the MLAs, with deliberations on the reports to be taken up later.

After the CAG reports are placed on the table, they will be preceded by a debate in the House, he further said. The reports are likely to reveal financial mismanagement by the erstwhile AAP-led governments during Arvind Kejriwal's rule. The BJP had repeatedly made allegations of financial mismanagement by the AAP during the election campaign, which it said had caused huge losses to the state exchequer.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi assured voters that his party’s government would ensure that "jinhone loota hai, unhe lautana padega" (those who have looted will have to return it). Similarly, Delhi’s new Chief Minister, Rekha Gupta, reaffirmed on her first day in office that the former AAP government would be held accountable for corruption allegations.

Quotes from some CAG reports that emerged in the public space showed a major revenue loss of over ₹2,026 crore on account of failures in Delhi's excise policy. The audit of the 2017-2022 liquor policy pointed to several issues, such as quality control, licensing, price, and systemic enforcement violations. The audit looked at three years of the old excise policy and one year of the recently abolished 2021-22 excise regime.