[This article was originally published at 2 pm on 21 March, a few hours before Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal was arrested by the ED.]
Delhi Chief Minister (CM) Arvind Kejriwal may well live to fight the upcoming Lok Sabha election instead of landing in jail as was being speculated following his persistent refusal to answer the summons from the Enforcement Directorate (ED).
The breather comes in the form of a Delhi High Court (HC) response to Kejriwal’s petition challenging the summons. The HC has given the CM and the ED time to reply to its queries and will hold the next hearing on 22 April. By then, the first phase of polling for the 2024 Lok Sabha election will be over and the nation will be just four days away from the second phase on 26 April.
Even die-hard Kejriwal baiters admit that it’s bad optics to arrest a sitting chief minister in the middle of an election battle.
No one plays the perception game better than the AAP chief. He has outwitted the Modi government and the BJP time and again by playing the victim and positioning himself as David to their Goliath to garner public sympathy. It would be foolhardy then for the central government to risk another losing confrontation by slapping Kejriwal behind bars just before the polls.
Why Kejriwal's Arrest Seemed Imminent
The ED is pursuing Kejriwal in two cases. One is the infamous Delhi excise policy case in which the agency is investigating allegations of money laundering against BRS chief and former Telangana CM K Chandrasekhara Rao’s daughter K Kavitha, Kejriwal’s own former deputy CM Manish Sisodia, and AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh.
All three have been arrested. The ED has issued nine summons to Kejriwal to come for questioning. He has evaded all nine using one pretext or another.
The other case, which seems to have come up as an afterthought following the ED’s failure to catch the AAP chief in the excise case, is related to kickbacks in a Delhi Jal Board contract to a private firm. So far, the ED has summoned him for questioning in this case only once.
K Kavitha’s recent arrest fuelled speculation that Kejriwal was the next on the ED hit list and would be picked up by the weekend. The move is on hold now that the High Court has listed the Delhi CM’s plea for hearing on 22 April.
Kejriwal Has No Intention of Surrendering Tamely
Kejriwal is like a cat with nine lives. He bounces back every time and he’s more resilient than when he’s fighting with his back to the wall.
Having burnt its fingers in confrontations with the AAP chief in the past, the Modi government has learnt to handle him with kid gloves. This may explain why it has refrained from arresting him so far despite his brazen refusal to answer the ED's summons.
Unlike former Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, now in jail after being arrested by the ED in a corruption case, Kejriwal is happiest when being confrontationist. Soren blinked after ten summons from the ED. He appeared before the Directorate and was questioned for seven hours. On his return, he resigned and handed over the CM’s post to Champai Soren. Moments later, ED picked him up and put him in jail.
Kejriwal has no intention of surrendering so tamely. His refusal to obey the ED’s summons is his way of throwing down the gauntlet to the Modi government. Arrest me if you dare, is what he seems to be saying. Using a combination of cunning political skills and incisive legal strategy, he has managed to stretch out this war of nerves until the eve of the polling.
Public Sympathy and Emotional Appeal for Votes
So what is it that makes the Modi government wary of taking him head-on? From the day that the AAP as a political newbie pipped the BJP to form a government in Delhi in the 2013 assembly election, the two parties have been at loggerheads.
Personal tensions between Modi and Kejriwal escalated when the latter contested against him in Varanasi in the Lok Sabha polls of 2014. Kejriwal was thrummed but that didn’t keep him down. The next year, his party swept to victory, decimating both the Congress and BJP. As Kejriwal fought for more space and powers for his government in the tiny city-state of Delhi, he proved to be a thorn in the Modi government’s side.
He managed to win every face-off by winning both public sympathy and political support from opposition parties. His winning streak ended when the Modi government used its powers to issue an ordinance restricting his powers as CM and put Delhi firmly back in the category of a Union Territory with the Lieutenant Governor in charge.
Although the ordinance was struck down by the Supreme Court, the government used its majority in Parliament to turn the ordinance into legislation. Since then, Kejriwal has been with a wing down while the ED has been closing in on him and his associates.
It is clear from the statements coming from Kejriwal and other AAP leaders that they fully intend to strategically play the victim in the upcoming polls and make an emotional appeal for votes. The BJP is hoping that ED investigations against AAP leaders will demolish the party’s trademark anti-corruption plank and prove that it is no different from the Congress party and all other opposition parties.
The battle is on. While Modi and his strategists are masters at planning for every eventuality, Kejriwal also manages to stay two steps ahead of his opponents. The moot point is whether the centre plucks up the courage to arrest the Delhi CM amid a high-voltage poll campaign.
(Arati R Jerath is a Delhi-based senior journalist. She tweets @AratiJ. This is an opinion piece and the views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for the same.)
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