This year in the months of January and March, two states had been in limelight on account of political events, with the arrest of their sitting Chief Ministers. While the arrest of Hemant Soren on the night of January 31 on account of alleged land scam was a major political event, the other event that remained in the limelight was the arrest of Arvind Kejriwal on March 21 due to alleged alcohol policy scam. The leaders of both the parties have termed these arrests as political vendetta and hold BJP responsible for these acts. These party leaders are of the view that all those party leaders who have been accused of scam and corruption join and agree to the offers of BJP, and all their charges get washed away the same way as the clothes get washed in washing machine. According to a latest report published by Indian Express, after 2014, 25 big opposition leaders who had serious corruption charges against them with action being taken by the national investigation agencies, had joined the BJP. At present, 23 of these cases have been done away with.
Political analysts too agree with the fact that on agreeing with or joining BJP, these allegations are lifted. Senior Journalist Urmilesh feels that nowadays there is a wait and watch strategy being applied before arresting these two. He says, “Both these persons were initially continuously pressurised by the ED. Attempt was made to destabilise their elected governments. Attempt was also made that both the parties i.e. Jharkhand Mukti Morcha and Aam Aadmi Party should contest the elections separately from the India Alliance. However, when these two made the picture clear about their alliance with the INDIA coalition, they got arrested. These arrests have made it clear that attempt has been made to weaken the position of these parties in Lok Sabha election. Both Hemant Soren and and Arvind Kejriwal are the main faces of their respective parties. And both were constantly fighting their political battle against Bharatiya Janata Party.” According to Urmilesh, the purpose for which they have been arrested has also had an impact; that is, leaving the party and leaders joining other parties. Hemant Soren's sister-in-law Sita Soren and AAP's lone MP from Punjab, Sushil Kumar Rinku, joining the BJP, can be seen as big examples.
Questions are being raised on the time and cases of arrest. Arvind Kejriwal’s lawyer has told the High Court, “On account of his arrest, it is clear that he will not be able to participate in the democratic activities. These violate the basic structure of the Constitution, including democracy, free and fair elections and equal opportunities. There was no need to arrest him on the charges against him (in this case).
Deputy CM of Delhi Manish Sisodia, the second in command in Aam Aadmi Party, has been imprisoned on the same charges of money laundering in the alleged alcohol scam as Arvind Kejriwal. Apart from them, another minister Satyendra Jain is also behind the bars.
The party was already struggling to have a face for its representation. After the arrest of Kejriwal, there is an issue of leadership within the party.
With regard to the timing of arrest, Anand Dutta, journalist, says, “With regard to Jharkhand, JMM and company were under pressure for last one year to either contest elections with BJP or alone. If JMM had succumbed to this pressure, Hemant Soren would not have been behind bars today. In this situation, BJP had got a hint that had these two (Kejriwal and Hemant) remained outside, it would have been difficult for BJP fight with them.”
Dutta adds, “BJP must have had a plan to present their image as corrupt. One can make out that from the way the Delhi case is being heard quickly; in the case of Hemant Soren in Jharkhand, the ED filed the charge sheet on time. It seems that this is an attempt to prove them corrupt.”
ED, arrests and similarities
Following Arvind Kejriwal and Hemant Soren’s arrests, their spouses have become politically active. Last week, Hemant Soren’s wife Kalpana Soren, who was in Delhi to participate in INDIA alliance rally, had gone to meet Sunita Kejriwal (Arvind Kejriwal’s wife) at her residence. Their picture of hugging each other has become quite viral.
At the time when Hemant Soren was arrested, Kejriwal had praised Hemant Soren in a meeting and said that attempts were made to topple and break his government; however, neither the government fell nor Hemant Soren gave in. Within two months of this statement, Kejriwal got arrested by ED.
Many similarities can be observed in the action of ED and arrests of Hemant Soren and Arvind Kejriwal. Right now both of them are behind bars in the money laundering case. Both of them have regional parties and along with being the Chief Ministers, they both are the main faces of their respective parties. Before the arrests were made, both of them were sent 10 summons each by the ED for questioning. However, they refused to be present at ED office. It is to be noted that both these arrests were made at night. After sending 10 summons to Hemant Soren, ED officials reached his residence to question him. Within a span of one week, ED conducted long interrogation with him twice and arrested him. Similarly, after 10 summons and interrogation at his residence, ED arrested Arvind Kejriwal.
Both of them had reached the High Court and the Supreme Court before their arrests against the summons. They had challenged ED summons. Shakil, a journalist who has been covering ED, says that the pattern of arrests is almost the same. Leave aside the resignation issue. After the tenth summon, Hemant Soren had told the ED that they could come to his house for questioning. However, ED had reached Kejriwal’s residence with the search warrant. Apart from this, ED had informed Hemant at 5 in the evening that he would be arrested. Hemant sought time to resign from the post of Chief Minister and the ED agreed to this. After the resignation process, he was arrested at 10 in the night. However, Kejriwal did not resign and said that he would be running the government from behind the bars. I believe that apart from this, they have had a similar pattern of arrest.
Just before the Lok Sabha elections, the arrest of two such Chief Ministers who are the strong faces of their respective parties and the INDIA alliance is being considered to be creating a dent in the alliance. At the moment, the possibility of both of them coming out on bail appears to be dim.
(Translation by Kaveri Mishra)
