Raid politics: Who will benefit

A day after the CBI raided chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s office, a major debate started in the political circles on Wednesday whether the Central government’s action would go in favour of the AAP or against the BJP.

While some political pundits feel that the raid against Mr Kejriwal’s close lieutenant Rajendra Kumar would vindicate the city government’s stand that the BJP-led Centre was vindictive, others feel that vehement protests by the AAP leadership could send a wrong message that the ruling party which stood for anti-corruption measures was now shielding an officer facing charges of corruption. A small section within the AAP feels that had the party leadership welcomed the CBI move and left it for the judiciary to take a final call on the matter, it would have brought dividends to it in the longer run.

As two strong non-BJP state chief ministers — Mamata Banerjee of West Bengal and Nitish Kumar of Bihar — along with the Congress condemned the raid, message in some quarters was loud and clear that if the saffron outfit would act against the non-BJP leaders, they are bound to join hands together to take on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. But some political pundits were of the view that the raid had also sent a clear signal to non-BJP ruled states that if they do not fall in line with the Centre, they too could face the wrath of the investigating agency.

A local Congress leader said that though he was totally in favour of the CBI carrying out investigations on the basis of a complaint filed by a senior bureaucrat, he does not endorse the way these raids were conducted. “Mr Kejriwal has rightly said that if corruption charges pertained to VAT and education departments, why did the CBI not raid these offices for relevant documents. Or, the investigating agency should have taken the CM into confidence before searching the office of his close confidant.”

To make his point, the Congress leader said just imagine a situation where a Central agency keeps the PM out of the loop on a corrupt official close to him and one fine morning locks him out of his office for searches. “How will our PM react to such a situation ”

However, a Delhi BJP leader said if the CBI had provided prior information to the CM, what was the guarantee he would not have tipped off his officer facing corruption charges. “By defending Mr Rajendra Kumar, Mr Kejriwal has made it clear that he was least interested in weeding out the corrupt officials, but more interested in playing politics. He simply wants to grab headlines by talking rubbish. Otherwise, no sane person could use words like psychopath for his Prime Minister.”

A senior AAP functionary said the BJP was trying to scare his party by involving the CBI.

“But such actions won’t deter us from raising our voice for pressing issues concerning the common man. Right from Day One, the Modi government has not been cooperating with the AAP administration, which clearly shows they do not want us to succeed in evolving an corruption-free mechanism in Delhi.”

A senior political analyst said that even if the CBI had taken any file related to the DDCA, it hardly matters. “After all, the CBI is a government agency and it has taken only official documents with it. The investigating agency can be approached to get back the DDCA file.”

However, the larger question is that the AAP seems to be in no mood to reach any understanding with the Centre for better and efficient day-to-day governance. The analyst said that the AAP wants to play the role of a victim so that it could gain sympathy in the Punjab Assembly elections. “The party has already got huge support from so many chief ministers. They want to carry on with their anti-saffron mission.”

Another political pundit said that the vehement opposition of the AAP against the CBI raid has raised the stature of Mr Kejriwal. “If the BJP thought it would cash in on the raid to deliver a blow to the moral halo around Mr Kejriwal, he pre-empted it by going on the offensive faster. He quickly converted it into a fight between him and the PM. The message is clear that Mr Kejriwal has the guts to take on Mr Modi.”