AA Edit | Kejriwal saga signals real intent of Central agencies

The misuse of the central investigative agencies by the Union government has been a topic of discussion in India for quite some time but it has gained extra traction after the second edition of the NDA government was installed in 2019. And it has reached its zenith with the attempts to hunt down Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal.

On the face of it, the agencies are chasing political executives and bureaucrats alleging that a government policy has resulted in pecuniary benefits to private persons. Whether it is justiciable or not is a question of law on which the courts need to take a call but the quality of the investigation being conducted by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the pieces of evidence it has collected was exposed when the Supreme Court made its wonderment public while hearing the bail petition of Mr Kejriwal’s former deputy Manish Sisodia arrested in the case. 

The agency had nothing in reply to submit to the court which showed that it was only making statements without basis. There is nothing in the form of documentary evidence against the politician who is completing one year of his life behind bars. 

Mr Kejriwal’s allegation that the government wants to arrest him before the Lok Sabha elections so that it can stop him from campaigning may sound politically motivated and his position that the summons issued to him would not stand the test of law is a legal presumption that can only be decided by the court. But the suggestion of the chief minister that he would answer any and every question the agency has in the case if they are sent to him has merit and needs to be looked into. 

The ED is supposed to be a professional agency working on documentary evidence aided by a law, the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002, which has draconian provisions. Statements given to its officers have evidentiary value. If the agency’s real intention is to collect information in a case, then it can very well adopt this method. If it still wants to pursue its course of using every section in the law to bring a sitting chief minister to his knees, then it cannot be seen as anything but harassment and misuse of the law. 

The agency is not new to deploying such tactics. The way it pounced on Bhupesh Baghel while he was facing an Assembly election as Chhattisgarh chief minister and the constant threat under which it keeps Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren are very much in public view. It has targeted former Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot while its attempts to trap former Kerala finance minister Thomas Isaac have repeatedly been frustrated by the high court. The latest episode in which the agency got egg on its face was when it dropped the case against two dalit farmers, aged 72 and 65, who own six acres of land in the Salem district of Tamil Nadu; the agency was ostensibly acting at the behest of a local BJP leader.

The ED came into being as part of a global effort to crack down on black money and the proceeds of crime. That objective turns into a farce if it is being used mainly to contain political opponents of those in power. The agency must go back to its original mandate: To dig out proceeds of crime and round up hawala operators.