Opposition parties, including the BJP, the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) and the Congress, sharpened their attack against the ruling Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in Punjab over the latter’s allegations that bribes were being offered to its (the AAP’s) legislators to topple the State government. They accused the AAP of trying to divert public attention from corruption cases linked to it.
The AAP hit back and said Opposition parties were working together to weaken democracy.
Several leaders from Opposition parties brought up the audio clip of a conversation that allegedly took place between State Minister Fauja Singh Sarari and his close aide, Tarsem Lal Kapoor. In the conversation, the duo are purportedly heard discussing a plan to extort money from food grain transporters. The AAP government has been on the defensive since the clip surfaced.
State Finance Minister Harpal Cheema said the audio clip was being examined and if the allegations are found to be true, action would be taken. Mr. Sarari maintains the audio clip has been doctored.
He demanded a probe by a sitting judge of the Supreme Court into the case of alleged horse-trading of Congress MLAs in Goa, Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, and the alleged attempt to bribe AAP MLAs from Punjab and Delhi to switch sides.
Meanwhile, SAD leader Bikram Singh Majithia on Thursday demanded a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Enforcement Directorate into the allegations levelled by the AAP on efforts to bribe its legislators. “A High Court-monitored probe could also be held on the issue,” he said.
Members of the BJP’s Punjab unit met Governor Banwari Lal Purohit. They sought a probe by a retired High Court judge into the AAP’s bribery allegations. The party’s State president, Ashwani Kumar Sharma, said the AAP’s allegations were “completely baseless” and sought to divert the attention of the public from the government’s failure to perform its duties. He also alleged internal factionalism, including discord brewing discord Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and Delhi Chief Minister and party chief Arvind Kejriwal, amid MP Raghav Chadha’s “interference” in Punjab. “An FIR (First Information Report0 has been registered in the case and the matter is being probed by the Vigilance Bureau, which is under the State government, hence we don’t expect a free and fair investigation,” Mr. Sharma said.
“The AAP was only trying to create a sensation to divert attention from corrupt deeds of Cabinet minister Fauja Singh Sarari and the government’s failures on all the fronts,” Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira said.
Addressing a press conference, Mr. Cheema accused the Congress of being “a ‘B-team’ of the BJP” and “clandestinely working for the saffron party”. He also alleged that the SAD was an alliance partner of National Democratic Alliance for a long time and, “it now wants to return to the BJP’s fold again; that’s why Akali leaders are corroborating the BJP’s statements”.
SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal has accused the AAP of targeting him in the 2015 Kotkapura and Behbalkalan police firing cases purely to divert attention from its own “scandals”. “I am being summoned repeatedly to divert attention from the scandals of this government, the latest one being the extortion scam of Minister Fauja Singh Sarari,” Mr. Badal said.
The Punjab Police on September 14 registered an FIR under Section 8 of the Prevention of Corruption Act, 1988 and Sections 171-B and 120-B of the Indian Penal Code, following a complaint filed by AAP MLAs on the offer of bribes to them. The investigation has been transferred to the Vigilance Bureau in the normal course.
