In the midst of his “battle” with the Centre, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday claimed that raids may be conducted targeting his ministerial colleagues Manish Sisodia and Satyendar Jain. Quoting unnamed PMO sources, he claimed that officers under Sisodia and Jain are being pressured to get something wrong signed from the two Ministers.
Hitting back at Kejriwal, BJP said it was yet another “lie” from the AAP leader and that he had a “habit” of making baseless charges without giving any evidence.
Earlier, Kejriwal tweeted, “PMO sources-Next raid on Manish or Satinder. Officers under them being pressurised to get something wrong signed from them.”
His allegations came a month after the CBI raided the Delhi Secretariat in connection with a case against his Principal Secretary Rajendra Kumar. “Modiji you do whatever you want, truth is with us, God is with us, you cannot do anything to us,” Kejriwal said in another tweet. later responding to a query pertaining to his tweets at the Press conference on odd-even scheme, Kejriwal said, the Modi Government was “trying its level best to fail us”.
“But they won’t succeed because our strengths are truth and honesty. There have been conspiracies against us but it won’t work. Our one and only strength is our transparency and truth,” he said
Following the raid, Kejriwal had unleashed a vitriolic attack on Prime Minister Narendra Modi, calling him a “coward and psychopath” while intensifying the face-off between ruling AAP and the Centre. He had even dragged Arun Jaitley in the verbal fight alleging that the CBI was primarily looking for a file which mentioned wrongdoings by the Finance Minister when he was heading the Delhi District Cricket Association (DDCA) from 1999 to 2013.
The AAP Government is at loggerheads with the Centre on a range of issues.
Reacting on the development, BJP national secretary Shrikant Sharma said, “This is yet another lie. He is making such baseless allegations out of his Modi-phobia and also to cover up the failures of his Government.”
It was a case of ‘chor machaye shor’ (thief making noise), he said, alleging that Sisodia was “misusing” over `525 crore publicity budget of the AAP Government and it was a “scam”.
The BJP media cell head referred to senior Delhi Government IAS officer Chetan B Sanghi’s charge that he was under “pressure” for naming a “certain VIP” in the DDCA probe panel report to attack Kejriwal, saying it had “exposed” his politics.
BJP said Kejriwal is doing everything he spoke against. “He had claimed that CBI had raided his office when the raid was on his Principal Secretary’s office. He spoke against corruption but his Ministers are looting the public money. He spoke against the use of Government bungalow and vehicle but this is what he is doing,” said Sharma, adding that the AAP leader should refrain from “scaring” the Central Government by making baseless charges against it.
“It is an intentional act to mislead and misguide the people of Delhi. It is dramatic, non-serious and irresponsible behaviour on the part of the Chief Minister of an elected Government. People of Delhi do not expect this. He should rather be serious and solve the problem of the people. Moreover, the Kejriwal Government is trying to divert the attention from the scams that have recently exposed them,” said Vijender Gupta, leader of Opposition in Delhi Assembly.