It would be an understatement to say that the past few days have been eventful for AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal. On Sunday, erstwhile AAP minister Kapil Mishra had claimed to have seen Kejriwal taking Rs 2 crores in cash from Delhi’s Health Minister Satyender Jain.
Going a step further, Mishra made another claim that Kejriwal and a few of his associates had delayed and influenced the investigation into the Rs 400 crore tanker scam which was allegedly overseen by ex-CM Sheila Dikshit.
Mishra though seems to be in no mood to stop and on Tuesday put out a dramatic open letter to Kejriwal which was full of emotionally charged rhetoric. Mishra proclaimed Kejriwal as his guru and claimed that he was going to file an FIR against him. He called his battle against Kejriwal the biggest of his life and sought the blessings of Kejriwal so that he (Mishra) may emerge victorious.
Mishra then proceeded to equate himself with Arjun’s son Abhimanyu and claimed that his mission was to break the “Chakraviyu” of Kejriwal’s lies, deceit and corruption.
Mishra also claimed that Kejriwal was planning on disqualifying him as an MLA. He claimed that he was ready to resign as an MLA and proceeded to challenge Kejriwal to contest elections against him at the seat of his (Kejriwal’s) choice.
Mishra also claimed that he had received about 211 complaints of corruption against the AAP and the Delhi government after he shared an email address with the public.
If Kapil Mishra isn’t a handful for Kejriwal and co, they are facing a major challenge on the financial front as well albeit due to their own actions. OpIndia in the past had analysed various advertisements issued all over India by the Delhi Government vis a vis the Supreme Court Order in 2016. We believed that they could be in contravention of SC orders.
This year the Aam Aadmi Party was indeed found to be in violation of that and was asked to pay back Rs 97 crores to the state exchequer. The new Lieutenant Governor (L-G) of Delhi had ordered the party to pay from their own packets.
AAP then decided to to challenge the L-G’s order before the Delhi High Court. AAP in its plea sought quashing of the demand notice issued on March 30 by the Delhi government’s Department of Information and Publicity (DIP) on L-G Anil Baijal’s direction to recover the amount from it.
This has prompted the Delhi High Court to seek replies from the Center and the L-G regarding AAP’s plea. A notice has also been issued to Congress leader Ajay Maken, as he was one of the persons who had red flagged the wastage of taxpayers funds.
All this legal wheeling costs money. And as revealed in the past, the party certainly has some expensive tastes when it comes to seeking legal aid. This was evident by the fact that Kejriwal choose to employ the services of top lawyer Ram Jethmalani for fighting the defamation case which was filed against him by Arun Jaitley.
This had resulted in Kejriwal getting billed about Rs 3.22 crores but he and his aides apparently had no intention of paying the amount themselves and it was revealed that AAP was using Delhi taxpayer’s money to pay the bills.
Now when it comes to the Rs 97 crore ad case, the order has been challenged by “AAP” and not the Delhi Government. So legally the party needs to pay all the expenses out of its own funds.
It remains to be seen if it adheres to the rules and coughs up the money or like the last time decides to make certain maneuvers to make the taxpayers’ pocket a bit lighter.
