1 week ago
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NEW DELHI: Accusing the Centre of “misusing”
Enforcement Directorate
to “crush” its political opponents ahead of the parliamentary elections, chief minister
Arvind Kejriwal
has told Supreme Court that his arrest was illegal, arbitrary and an unprecedented assault on the tenets of democracy based on free and fair elections and federalism.
Countering the allegations of the agency that he was the “kingpin” of the alleged excise policy scam, CM said
ED
was acting with “malicious intent” against him in a gross affront to due process of law and there was no evidence of money laundering against him and his party, AAP.
He said that the case was registered almost two years ago but the agency decided to act against him only after election dates were announced to give an “unjust upper hand” to central govt in the elections.
Kejriwal, in his affidavit filed in the apex court, said, “The mode, manner and timing of the arrest of the petitioner just before the
Lok Sabha elections
, when the schedule had been announced and the model code of conduct had come into play, speaks volumes about the arbitrariness of ED. This timeline establishes the fact that the petitioner has been arrested intentionally with mala fide intent without any necessity to arrest.”
Responding to the allegation that he misused his office and demanded a bribe, the CM said, “The present case is a classic case of how the ruling party-led central govt has misused the central agency, ED, and its wide powers under PMLA to crush its biggest political opponent, Aam Aadmi Party, and its leaders.”
He told the apex court that the ED’s statement that he defied summons is a “blatant falsehood” as each summons had been duly responded to by raising pertinent issues which have not been responded to and the probe agency has maintained an “eerie silence”.
“There is also an issue of the ED abusing its power of arrest in the middle of the general elections and while relying on the same material as was in possession months before its arrest. In such circumstances, the case of the petitioner is peculiar and grave and warrants urgent intervention of this court to protect life and liberty of an individual...The petitioner’s arrest constitutes an unprecedented assault on the tenets of democracy based on ‘free and fair elections’ and ‘federalism’, both of which form significant constituents of the basic structure of Constitution,” he said.
“The central govt agency illegally ‘picked up’ a sitting chief minister and the national convenor of one of the six national opposition parties in India just five days after the general elections were called and the model code of conduct was put in place. The petitioner’s political party is in direct opposition to the ruling political party at the Centre in the on-going elections. During an election cycle when political activity is at its highest, his illegal arrest has caused grave prejudice to his political party and will provide the ruling party at the Centre an unjust upper hand in the ongoing elections,” he said.
Kejriwal argued that “the entire basis of the petitioner’s arrest rests upon certain statements which are in the nature of self-incriminating confessions by alleged accomplices who have been given immunity by way of pardon etc. These alleged incriminating evidences, therefore, were obtained under an arrangement without any corroborative evidence.”
In this context, he recalled the chain of events involving Magunta Sreenivasulu Reddy, P Sarath Reddy and Satya Vijay Naik. He accused ED of suppressing certain statements. “It is a settled law by this Hon’ble Court that it is the investigating officer’s duty to ‘unearth the truth’ but not to prosecute the accused person by cherry picking a few statements here and there…This approach would clearly reveal that ED proceeds on the basis that it has a right to conceal documents which are in favour of the accused from the court and the accused. This negates the very principle of fair trial and fair investigation.”
Dealing with the allegation of cash payments to an AAP candidate in the Goa elections, the affidavit says, “There exists no proof or material demonstrating that AAP received funds or advanced kickbacks from the South group, let alone utilizing them in the Goa election campaign. Not a single rupee was traced back to AAP and the allegations put forth in the regard are devoid of any tangible evidence, rendering them vague and baseless without any corroboration.”
Responding to the allegation of “large-scale destruction of evidence” as a ground for his arrest, Kejriwal said there is not a single averment alleging destruction of evidence of any kind by him and hence the ground cited was devoid of any merit.
CM in a letter says
The present case is a classic case of how the ruling party-led central govt has misused the central agency, ED, and its wide powers under PMLA to crush its biggest political opponent, Aam Aadmi Party, and its leaders
English (US) ·