‘Our sources say Centre sending ED to arrest Jain’

Kejriwal says his leaders are unfazed and are waiting to host the money-laundering agency

NEW DELHI: With Assembly elections nearing in Punjab, Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday publicly claimed that the Bjp-led Union government was forcing the Enforcement Directorate to arrest his government’s Cabinet minister Satyendar Jain.

“What’ll happen with Satyendar Jain? They’ll send him to jail, he’ll come out on bail after 5-10 days. They won’t have a single proof for the courts to see,” party’s national Convener Kejriwal said.

Kejriwal said his party leaders are unfazed by the opposition’s vendetta politics and are waiting to host the money-laundering agency with open arms — even as a defiant Jain took to Twitter and said: “If BJP thinks that we too will be scared like Channi ji, then they are wrong. I challenge BJP to send ED as well as CBI, Income Tax to everyone, we are not afraid of anyone!”

“This is an old trick of the BJP. When it realises it will lose elections, it sends out the Central agencies to prey on us,” Kejriwal added in his public address on Sunday morning.

He said that the Bjp-led Union government had had two raids conducted on Jain’s premises till now but hadn’t been able to find even a rupee unaccounted for. “Our conscience is clear, we have nothing to fear. Appeal to the BJP

to send out the CBI, Income Tax and Delhi Police behind us too,” he said.

Significantly, a few days ago, the Enforcement Directorate had conducted raids in Punjab in a case related to illegal sand mining, including at the premises of Punjab CM Charanjit Singh Channi’s nephew, from where they said they retrieved Rs 10 crore in cash. Now, Kejriwal has said that the AAP’S “sources” have revealed to them that the Union government was “forcing” the ED to arrest Satyendar Jain. “They are trying to frame him in false and imaginary charges so they can hurt AAP’S electoral frays,” the party said in a statement.

Kejriwal added that his party does not fear jails or the raids.

“We won't spiral into a hue and cry spectacle like Charanjit Singh Channi who was on the wrong side and his mountains of cash have been exposed. If BJP wants they can raid my house or Deputy CM Manish Sisodia and party's Punjab CM candidate Bhagwant Mann well,” he said.

“This conspiracy is being hatched during the peak of the elections so there won't just be raids. Probably, there will be arrests too. We are not afraid of that as well. Once you tread on the path of Satya(truth), you are ready to overcome all these obstacles as well,” Kejriwal said.

He added that he and his deputy Manish Sisodia have also faced raids out of political vendetta earlier in which 21 of the party's MLAS were arrested but in the end, the courts rubbished the charges that were framed.

“Channi has been making a spectacle out of the raids conducted on his relatives because he knows he is the wrong one out there. Everyone by now has seen the mountains of cash he was sitting on that got exposed during the raids,” Kejriwal concluded.