NEW YORK: The alleged liquor scam has undergone multiple layers of scrutiny and is being acted upon under judicial oversight. Therefore, comments from Western countries become all the more unacceptable.
A sitting Chief Minister belonging to an adversarial party and a leading member of the opposition I.N.D.I Alliance arrested by the ED days before a crucial general election: the optics are appalling; it smacks of an authoritarianism more in keeping with a banana republic than a large well-established democracy. However, once you cut through the diversionary hyperbole, the cries of “democracy is in danger” emanating from some Western nations and the perpetual BJP bashing and analyze l’affair Kejriwal for what it is, a different scenario emerges, that of political gamesmanship and double standards.
At the heart of this controversy is the following dilemma: Is Arvind Kejriwal the innocent victim of political Machiavellianism, or is he a crafty politician playing with public perceptions to mask his alleged role in the Delhi liquor scam?
In 2021, the AAP government in Delhi promulgated a new liquor policy, Delhi’s Excise Policy (2021-22). This new policy was ostensibly executed to mitigate government control of selling liquor and hand over the retailing to private vendors to enhance the consumer experience. The profit margins, however, that this new policy would generate were incredibly high, leading to accusations of corruption and money laundering.
Delhi Congress President Chaudhary Anil Kumar was one of the first to file a complaint with the Delhi police in 2022 alleging a multi-crore scam. A series of similar complaints prompted a report by the Chief Secretary of Delhi and eventually led to the CBI and ED getting involved. Therefore, for the Congress Party to cry foul today, post Kejriwal’s arrest is rank hypocrisy and a U-turn that smells of political expediency at its worst.
CPI(M)’s Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, a member of the I.N.D.I Alliance rightly summed this up: “When the Delhi government faced corruption charges with regard to the liquor policy, the Congress was leading the attack against the Kejriwal government.
When Manish Sisodia was arrested in the case, the Congress asked why Kejriwal was not arrested. They continued with it till he was arrested. Now they have changed their stand.”
Is Kejriwal the spotless anti-corruption crusader that he was during the Anna Andolan or the Anti-Corruption Movement of 2011? His critics say that Kejriwal, the founder of the AAP and CM of Delhi, is now a transformed individual, a politician with all the required guiles. His former colleague and close compatriot in the anti-corruption movement, Supreme Court advocate Prashant Bhusan has doubts about his integrity. Recently in an interview he remarked: “I can’t say about that. I mean earlier (when we were part of the IAC) I didn’t think he would be (corrupt), but later (after he founded the AAP, contested elections and became Delhi chief minister) I’m not so sure. “
Second, Arvind Kejriwal’s interactions with the ED do not burnish his credentials as a law-abiding citizen. Since late last year, Kejriwal has evaded nine ED summons. Had he heeded the summons the need to arrest him would not have risen.
On 3 April, during the hearing with regard to Arvind Kejriwal’s plea for interim relief, the ED stated that Kejriwal was “totally uncooperative”, “evasive”, gave “misleading replies” and “concealed information” during his questioning. Additional Solicitor General S.V. Raju averred that there is “categorical finding that there has been money laundering” and that Kejriwal is “involved personally.”
The ASG further contended that a “large number of phones and electronic devices have been destroyed…. All this cash payment to large number of people, vendors, advertisers and workers was done in cash. That cash is not accounted for. It may be Rs 100 crore or little less. The money trail is there. We have located the money trail. ……We have WhatsApp chats we have hawala operators statements. It’s not as if we are shooting in the dark. We have large amount of Income Tax data … We have established, evidence shows that the kickbacks were used for election campaign of AAP in Goa. So, the AAP is beneficiary because it used the money.”
The ED arguments appear to have convinced the judiciary.
On 9 April, Justice Swarana Kanta Sharma of the Delhi High Court, while dismissing Kejriwals’s petition challenging his arrest, indicated that there was “enough material” to justify his arrest and that the remand was “not illegal.”
Further she went on to address the political accusations swirling in the air: “This court observed that political considerations and equations cannot be brought before a court of law as they are not relevant for legal proceedings. In the case at hand, it is important to clarify that the matter before this court is not a conflict between the central government and petitioner Kejriwal. Instead, it is a case between Kejriwal and Directorate of Enforcement.”
He was remanded to further judicial custody by the High Court. The Supreme Court too does not appear to be in a hurry to provide him relief, and has put off his hearing till the end of the month.
All this appears as a classic example of a politician gaming the system to camouflage his deeds and project himself as a victim of authoritarianism and a martyr to the cause of democracy.
Some western nations like Germany and the United States waded into this controversy by their unrequited pontifications. Commenting on the arrest a US spokesman remarked: “We continue to follow these actions closely, including the arrest of Arvind Kejriwal. We encourage fair, transparent and timely legal processes…”
India’s foreign ministry strongly rebutted this interference: “India’s legal processes are based on an independent judiciary which is committed to objective and timely outcomes. Casting aspersions on that is unwarranted.”
In conclusion, the liquor scam has undergone multiple layers of scrutiny (at the Chief Secretary level, CBI and ED) and is being acted upon under judicial oversight. Therefore, comments from Western countries become all the more unacceptable, as they reflect an embarrassing ignorance of the issue. As to our homegrown critics, they are indulging in nothing more than gaslighting.
The optics of Kejriwal’s arrest may look terrible to many, but the reality may turn out to be in keeping with the law of the land.