If MLAs are jailed, we will hold our cabinet meets at Tihar, says AAP

The Delhi government is prepared to run from Tihar jail if Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal is arrested, said Delhi cabinet ministers.

The Delhi government will be run from theTihar jail and cabinet meetings will be held from jail premises -- justin case Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal is arrested by the investigative agencies. This is what Delhi cabinet ministers said on Monday after an Aam Admi Party (AAP) legislative group reiterated their support for Kejriwal in a meeting held at theDelhi assembly.

The Aam Admi Party (AAP) legislative group meeting on Monday. (HT Photo)

On October 30,theEnforcement Directorate (ED) asked Kejriwal to appear before it on November 2 in connection with the money laundering probe in the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy. The Delhi CM termed the summons “illegal,” didn’t appear before the ED on November 2, and flew to poll-bound Madhya Pradesh to address a rally instead.

At the Monday meeting, Kejriwal sat on the dias along with the speaker Ram Niwas Goel. “Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders are openly threatening that the Delhi chief minister will be jailed. All MLAs unanimously said that even if BJP sends Arvind Kejriwal to the jail by hatching a conspiracyagainst him, he must not resign. Arvind Kejriwal is the choice of people of Delhi and if need arises, he will run the government from Tihar. The people of Delhi have provided the mandate to Arvind Kejriwal not any party or symbol,” said Delhi minister Atishi who holds several importantportfolios such as finance, planning, PWD and revenue.

She added that if the need arises, permission will be sought from the court to send all important files to Tihar jail, and to hold cabinet meetings there.

Delhi ministerSaurabh Bharadwaj, who is also the health and urban development minister of Delhi, said, “The BJP has lost three elections againstArvind Kejriwal and now conspiracy is being hatched to remove him from power. AAP MLAs have said that pressure is being created on the chief minister to put up a question mark on how Delhi will be run in his absence,” he added.

Bharadwaj said that the current situation indicatesthat the people’s right to elect a government is being challenged. “The current atmosphere shows ministers may also go to jail. I may be in jail no 1, Atishi may be in jail number 2, and cabinet meetings toowill be held inside the jail. Officers will be called to the jail and those MLAs who remain outside will get these decisions enforced. The work will not stop,” he added.

He said that there is no precedence that a sitting chief minister is sent to jail in an ongoing trial. Meanwhile, BJP spokesperson Praveen Shankar Kapoor said that this is a lie. “One of his current political mentors, Lalu (Prasad)Yadav was CM when the CBI arrested him in 1997 and he made his wife the CM. Even Tamil Nadu CM Jaylalitha was arrested in a corruption case in 2014,” he said.

Delhi BJP secretary Harish Khurana said that Atishi and Bhardwaj were enacting a ‘political melodrama.’ “Ever since the Supreme Court, while rejecting the bail application of Manish Sisodia observed, that a money trail of ₹338 crores appears established, Kejriwal and his coterie have been repeatedly expressing that the CM may soon be arrested while no investigating agency has said anything like this,” he added.