News Outlets Falsely Claim Kejriwal Blamed Sisodia For Liquor Policy Scam

Kejriwal refuted the claims made by media reports and called himself and Sisodiya "innocent".

Fact-check: A false statement about Arvind Kejriwal blaming Manish Sisodia for the liquor policy scam is going viral online.

(Photo: The Quint)

Social media users, along with several media outlets are attributing a remark to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and claiming that he blamed Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia for the liquor policy scam.

The reports are also attributing Kejriwal's statement to Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

Who shared it?: News18, Lokmat and Free Press Journal shared this claim.

An archive can be seen here.

An archive can be seen here.

An archive can be seen here.

(Archives of users sharing this claim can be seen here and here.)

What's the truth?: Kejriwal addressed city's Rouse Avenue Court on Wednesday, 26 June and denied media reports claiming that he had blamed Sisodia for the scam.

How did we find out the truth?: We performed a relevant keyword search using 'Arvind Kejriwal blames Sisodia for scam' on Google and this led us to a report by Live Law published on 26 June 2024.

• The article stated that Kejriwal clarified on Wednesday at the city's Rouse Avenue Court that these media reports claiming that he blamed Deputy Sisodia are "scam".

• According to the report, Kejriwal said, "A false narrative is being spread by CBI sources in media that I have put the blame of liquor policy scam on Manish Sisodia. I have not made any such statement blaming Manish Sisodia or any other person. I had said that Manish Sisodia is innocent. Aam Aadmi Party is innocent. I am innocent. But CBI's plan is to malign us in the media. Please record that CBI sources have spread fake news in the media.”

The report is from 26 June 2024.

(Source: Live Law/Screenshot)

• Bar and Bench was also sharing live updates from the hearing and stated that Kejriwal refuted these viral claims.

Advocate DP Singh, the special prosecutor representing CBI in court, also remarked on the reports, clarifying that "no source said anything," and that the CBI "are not the sources" of the claim, as per Live Law's thread of posts on X.

CBI's counsel also refuted the claim.

(Source: Live Law/Altered by The Quint)

• Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) also took to X (formerly Twitter) to clarify that this viral claim is false.

• The post stated that Kejriwal did not make any such statement about blaming Sisodia and that the CBI is now "run by BJP".

• It added that even the judge in the court admitted that Kejriwal did not make any such statement as claimed by CBI.

Conclusion: A false statement about Arvind Kejriwal blaming Manish Sisodia for the liquor policy scam is going viral online.

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