Two top ministers in Delhi arrested on serious charges and its governance model in Punjab under strain, the AAP’s national ambitions seem to have suffered a blow ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha poll battle.
Sample this: Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia held as many as 18 portfolios, more than half of a total of 33 in the Delhi government. Half a dozen were allotted to him from Satyendra Jain’s kitty, following the minister’s arrest last year. That fact, apart from Sisodia virtually being the number two in the AAP, shows that his arrest by the CBI has larger implications for the party than Jain’s incarceration.
Last year, it was Sisodia who declared Arvind Kejriwal as the prime ministerial face for the AAP for 2024 and spoke about the party’s national footprint plans. He, however, not only faces charges in an alleged liquor scam in Delhi but has the sword of yet another arrest hanging over his head – an alleged snooping case, in which the ministry of home affairs sanctioned the CBI to issue an FIR against him last week. This could make bail difficult. The Enforcement Directorate is also set to step in on action against him.
The AAP has come out all guns blazing against Sisodia’s arrest, terming it the BJP’s “political vendetta” and citing that agencies did not have concrete proof of material gains by Sisodia as a minister and challenged the CBI to prove the charges in court.
The party has, so far, also brazened out charges against Jain. It has refused to sack him as a minister despite him being behind bars for long, enjoying alleged undue favours from jail officials as well as allegations against him from jailed conman Sukesh Chandrashekhar.
BJP’s strategy
The BJP retorted that if Jain was innocent, why had he not yet succeeded in securing bail. According to CBI sources, there is a “water-tight case” against Sisodia, alleging that the liquor scam and snooping case led to his chair.
“Just because he was a ‘good’ education minister, as AAP claims, does not mean he can get away with big-time corruption in other spheres… The agencies are doing their job. Will Arvind Kejriwal also take away ministry portfolios from Sisodia, like from Jain, but not sack him?” a senior BJP leader told News18.
The BJP is now cornering the AAP on charges of corruption and questioning the “kattar imaandaar” claim made by Kejriwal, while also comparing it to the Congress going out of power in 2014. The BJP is also pointing at the “Khalistan narrative” gaining ground in Punjab under its newly formed government and alleged inaction against the likes of ‘Waris Punjab De’ leader Amritpal Singh.
The BJP’s narrative is pinpointed – that the AAP is not only corrupt but also unable to govern. The AAP said the loss in the MCD elections had hurt the saffron party while Kejriwal’s party was looking at gaining public sympathy over the arrest of its leaders.
Fisticuffs between BJP and AAP councillors in the MCD House last week could well be a trailer to a massive BJP-AAP showdown in the next one year.
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