A day after being sacked from the Delhi Government, Kapil Mishra accused Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal of taking Rs2 crore from his Cabinet colleague Satyendar Jain, a charge vehemently refuted by Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia.
Sisodia said the allegations of corruption levelled by Mishra was bogus. “His allegations do not merit a response. He has been sacked due to poor performance,” Sisodia told reporters while responding to Mishra’s sweeping allegations. “The allegations are absurd, and there are no facts,” he added.
Kejriwal’s mentor and social activist Anna Hazare said he was deeply saddened by the latest controversy surrounding his former protégé and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.”
“I am deeply saddened by whatever I saw on television,” Hazare told the media after sacked Delhi Water Minister Kapil Mishra said he saw Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain hand over Rs2 crore to Kejriwal at his Delhi residence. Anna said he had been fighting corruption for the last 40 years and Kejriwal had joined his fight against the menace.
Senior AAP leader Kumar Vishwas came out in support of Arvind Kejriwal, saying he has known him for 12 years and even his enemies cannot imagine him taking bribe.
“We can disagree, fight or be disappointed with each other... I know Arvind for 12 years and I can say that I cannot imagine him taking bribe or being corrupt... Even his enemies cannot imagine this,” he told reporters.
Mishra’s allegations came amid growing rumblings in the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) after the drubbing in recently held municipal elections in the national Capital.
“I saw with my own eyes Satyendar Jain giving Rs2 crore in cash to Arvind Kejriwal at his residence. When I asked Kejriwal, he said such things happen in politics and it will be revealed later,” Mishra told reporters after paying homage to Mahatma Gandhi at his memorial at Rajghat on Sunday morning.
Mishra went further and alleged that Satyender Jain, the Health and PWD Minister in the AAP Government, told him “personally” that he had “settled a land deal of Kejriwal’s relative”. “Jain personally told me that he had settled a land deal worth Rs50 crore of Kejriwal’s relative. When I conveyed it to Kejriwal about it, he said that it was a lie and asked me to have faith in him,” Mishra alleged.
Mishra, who held Water and Tourism Portfolio in the Arvind Kejriwal Government, was summarily sacked in a late night development on Saturday after he supported senior party leader Kumar Vishwas, who has been at loggerheads with the AAP dispensation.
Mishra claimed that he has given a statement to the lieutenant-Governor regarding irregularities seen by him during his two-year stint as a Cabinet Minister in Delhi.
Mishra claimed that he was given the marching orders after he put pressure on the party leaders over matters of “corruption” that have been taking rounds for quite some time.
“I want to ask if it was so, why Kejriwal and Sisodia did not say it earlier. If they were fooling people when they were talking about work done by their Government in developing water supply in the city,” the former Delhi Water Minister said.
For a long time, talks about different types of “corruption” involving fundings, Punjab elections and the Delhi Government have been making rounds, he said.
“I saw some of it with my own eyes but I believed in Kejriwal and felt no one can corrupt him. The cases of money laundering, black money and appointment of daughter of a minister (Jain), luxury bus scheme, CNG fitness test scam, all these were in his knowledge and I always believed he will take action.”
Mishra insisted that he will fight “corruption” while remaining in the AAP and no one can throw him out from the party.
“AAP is my party, no one can throw me out of the party. We will sweep corruption away from the party and I have come here (Rajghat) to begin this work,” he said.
Mishra asserted his honesty saying he was a Minister in the Kejriwal Government for two years but faced no corruption charges.
“I am the only Minister in this Government who is not facing any enquiry either from the Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) or the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI)” and who has not appointed his daughter or relative on any post,” Mishra claimed.