The Aam Aadmi Party government in Delhi on Monday described as “bogus” the chargesheet the police have filed in connection with the alleged assault on Chief Secretary Anshu Prakash in February. Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and his deputy Manish Sisodia are among 13 AAP MLAs named in the document.
The police booked Kejriwal and Sisodia under several sections of the Indian Penal Code, including 120B (criminal conspiracy), 353 (assault or criminal force to deter public servant from discharge of duty), and 504 (intentional insult with intent to provoke breach of peace), reported News18.
Legislators Amanatullah Khan, Prakash Jarwal, Nitin Tyagi, Rituraj Govind, Sanjeev Jha, Ajay Dutt, Rajesh Rishi, Rajesh Gupta, Madan Lal, Parveen Kumar and Dinesh Mohania were also named in the chargesheet. Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Samar Vishal will consider the matter on August 25, PTI reported.
Delhi ministers Gopal Rai, Satyender Jain, Kailash Gahlot, Rajendra Pal Gautam and Imran Hussain, in a joint statement, called the chargesheet “based on imaginary and false allegations by frustrated elements”. They labelled the document a result of the Centre’s “ongoing witch-hunt against the Delhi government, that was elected with highest-ever mandate in India’s electoral history”.
The statement claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bharatiya Janata Party National President Amit Shah, after losing the 2015 Delhi elections, “have relentlessly unleashed all their agencies with full might to crush the Delhi government to fulfill their arrogant desire of seeking complete revenge”. The ministers deplored that the Centre has “learnt no lessons” from AAP legislators being discharged by the court in 19 out of 22 cases filed against them since 2015.
“The BJP’s Central government through its consistent misuse of official might, will not be able to terrorise the Delhi government, which has been carrying on its pro-people agenda despite all possible hurdles [imposed] by the Centre, the lieutenant governor, central agencies and sections of bureaucracy,” the statement asserted.
Accusing the Centre of turning the Delhi Police into a “mere political tool” and having “shamelessly played with the credibility of the force”, the ministers claimed that “the bogus chargesheet will be torn to shreds when it will be put to legal scrutiny”.
Prakash had claimed that he was assaulted by Jarwal and Amanatullah Khan at Kejriwal’s residence on February 19. The police had questioned 11 AAP legislators who were present, including Kejriwal and Sisodia. Kejriwal’s adviser, VK Jain, resigned a few weeks after the incident. Jain, who was a witness in the case, was also questioned by the police.
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