Kejriwal led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has suffered yet another severe blow. This time around, the Delhi police have filed a chargesheet against Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal, his deputy Manish Sisodia, and 11 other MLAs in connection with the assault on chief secretary, Anshu Prakash. Amanatullah Khan, Prakash Jarwal, Nitin Tyagi, Rituraj Govind, Sanjeev Jha, Ajay Dutt, Rajesh Rishi, Rajesh Gupta, Madan Lal, Parveen Kumar and Dinesh Mohania are the 11 MLAs who have been named as accused in the chargesheet. The final police report has been filed before Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Samar Vishal, who has kept the matter for consideration on August 25. The case had been registered on a complaint lodged by the chief secretary, Anshu Prakash.
The accused have reportedly been charged under sections 186, 323, 332, 342, 353, 504, 120B, 109, 114, 149, 34 and 36 of the Indian Penal Code. It includes the offences of voluntarily causing hurt, obstructing a public servant, conspiracy, unlawful assembly, assault or criminal force to deter a public a public servant in discharge of his duties, etc.
Additional Public Prosecutor who had appeared before the court in the month of February when the complaint was filed had then submitted that the assault by elected representatives on such a senior official was an “unfortunate and shameful” incident. He added that the top bureaucrat was forced to “consent on a certain thing” during the meeting which was held at the chief minister’s residence and where the other 11 MLAs were also present. “He was initmated and assaulted by two people. He had also sustained injuries. The injured areas-both ears-show tenderness and mild swelling. There are bruises too.”
It seems that this assault was not a spontaneous act but a well planned conspiracy to pressurise the senior-most bureaucrat in Delhi by calling him for a meeting at midnight at the chief minister’s residence. As per the reports, the dispute allegedly revolved around the chief secretary’s reluctance to grant more funds to the Delhi government for advertisements to publicize their work. Even the Delhi chief minister was not a silent player. In his complaint, Prakash stated that the dispute allegedly revolved around the chief secretary’s reluctance to grant more funds to the Delhi government for advertisements to publicize their work. Thereafter, MLA Amanatullah Khan and one other MLA allegedly beat up Prakash.
This shameless act by AAP which followed counter allegations against the chief secretary instead of a humble apology had led to a standoff between the Delhi government and its bureaucrats. However, the Kejriwal government which was oblivious towards the welfare of Delhi started defaming IAS officers and concocting lies about the bureaucrats. Kejriwal led AAP started falsely propagating that the bureaucrats were staging a strike in conspiracy and connivance with Prime Minister Modi. However, this lie was exposed by a press conference held by the IAS officers in which they made it clear that the information stating that IAS officers are on strike in Delhi is completely false and baseless.
Now that the Delhi police have filed the chargesheet, it seems that Kejriwal and his men will finally have to pay for their misdeeds. This was indeed one of the most tragic moments in India’s independent history when elected representatives made undue demands to a top level bureaucrat and on his not bowing down to pressure tactics, physically assaulted him. Kejriwal and his men if they were involved in this act not only deserve stern punishment but also driven out of the political arena. One hopes that this case will reach a reasonable conclusion after the filing of the chargesheet promptly and the accused will be punished severely, if found guilty.