The AAP on Wednesday strongly reacted to the arrest of its Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh in connection with an excise policy scam case saying the action shows the BJP’s frustration as it is going to lose to the INDIA bloc.
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday called the arrest of senior AAP leader Sanjay Singh “completely illegal” and claimed that more Opposition leaders will be arrested in the run-up to the 2024 parliamentary elections.
“The arrest of Sanjay is completely illegal. This shows (Prime Minister Narendra) Modi’s nervousness. They will arrest many more opposition leaders until the elections,” the AAP national convener said in a post on X. Earlier in the day, the Chief Minister claimed “more than 1,000 raids” had failed to find “a single paise” of illegally acquired money.
Delhi Minister and senior leader Atishi said Singh was arrested by the ED as he raised voice for the people and it is beginning of the end for the BJP.
“Who knows how much more the BJP will stoop due to its fear.. Before the elections, their frustration of losing to INDIA is clearly visible. After Manish ji and Satyendra ji, the government also arrested Sanjay Bhaiya, who raised the voice of the people strongly,” she posted on X.
“Why don’t they open an ED office in our party office itself? It seems that they only survive by making false allegations against AAP,” the Cabinet Minister said in a post. Earlier Kejriwal termed the ED raids at Singh’s residence the “last desperate attempt” of a party that is staring at defeat in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Kejriwal also hit out at the ruling BJP (he did not name them) and accused Modi’s party of “desperate attempts” to derail rivals ahead of next year’s general election.
“For the last year we have been seeing... there is noise about alleged liquor scam. More than 1000 raids have been conducted and not a single paise was recovered. They just keep alleging ‘scam’,” Kejriwal said, “I did a lot of investigation and found nothing.
“This has been going on for a year... nothing has been found till now (and) nothing is going to be found from Sanjay Singh’s place too. Elections are coming and they feel (they) are losing... so it appears the last desperate attempt of the losing side,” he told reporters during his visit at Okhla landfill site.
“The BJP is rattled. They believe that they’re going to face massive defeat in the national elections of 2024. These are the last desperate attempts of a losing party. Yesterday it happened with many journalists, now it’s happening with Sanjay Singh, and as elections come closer it’ll happen to many,” he claimed.
The Chief Minister said such raids will only increase as the election nears. “ED, CBI, I-T and police — all the agencies will become active as the elections come closer. Yesterday, it was journalists and today, it is Singh,” he added.
Delhi Cabinet Minister Gopal Rai echoed similar views and claimed the panic of the impending defeat in the Lok Sabha polls was the reason behind the raids.
“The way journalists were targeted on October 3 also indicates an attempt to silence any voice against those in power, which I believe is against democracy. The BJP should have trust in the people. Misusing agencies to silence voices won’t win elections, and history states this,” he said. Rai’s Cabinet colleague Atishi asserted that the BJP is afraid of the AAP.
Later in the day, addressing a press conference, Delhi minister Saurabh Bharadwaj said this is an imaginary scam that has been under scrutiny for the past 15 months. He said Singh is one of the formidable voices in the opposition and he has been questioning the Centre over a range of issues. AAP chief national spokesperson Priyanka Kakkar called the raids “vendetta” politics.
