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Goa AAP rejects charges of spending Delhi excise policy proceeds for state polls
Aam Aadmi Party Goa state president Amit Palekar said that the party was on its own in the 2022 assembly elections in the state
The Aam Aadmi Party in Goa protested the arrest of its national convener and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal in the excise policy case, terming it politically motivated while refuting the Enforcement Directorate (ED)’s charge that the money from the alleged scam was used for the assembly election campaign in the coastal state in 2022.
Speaking to HT, AAP state party president Amit Palekar said that the party was “on its own” in the Goa assembly elections.
“I’ve been a defence lawyer and this case is based entirely on statements recorded by people who have turned approver and who have donated money to the BJP via electoral bonds. There is no documentary evidence or any proof that any money was involved. Tomorrow if I say that the Goa chief minister has offered me ₹25 crore to join the BJP, will you arrest him?” Palekar said.
“For the state assembly elections, we were on our own. In fact, the BJP was spending the most money. The areas where they spent the most money got the most votes,” he added.
AAP MLA and leader in the state legislative assembly Venzy Viegas told HT that the allegation that the party spent money from the kickbacks received for the liquor policy “was completely without any proof, just like the rest of the case.”
“Let the ED come before the courts with any hard evidence if they have any,” he added.
“The liquor policy was a policy of the government in which there are several people responsible. Similarly there are so many other bad policies that the Goa government has made -- a policy for the carting off of iron ore dumps in Goa in which the government itself doesn’t know what is the grade of ore that is being allowed to be stolen in the name of dumps, or the Goa government’s policy to allow case by case change of land categorisation so that more and more areas be opened for development,” Viegas added.
“It is for the first time in the history of India that sitting chief ministers are being jailed. Even in the emergency things were not so bad. This is nothing but dictatorial tendencies to quell the opposition ahead of the polls. This is going to affect India’s standing among leading democracies of the world,” Viegas said.
The party protested the arrest of their leader vowing to take forward his fight against the BJP and his model of good governance focusing on health and education for all.
The BJP, meanwhile, has defended Kejriwal’s arrest with state party president Sadanand Shet Tanavade saying that the arrest was “as per law”. “Kejriwal was evading summons issued by the ED and his arrest was as per law. Parrikar (former Goa chief minister Manohar Parrikar) too faced a CBI probe, but he attended the summons,” Tanavade said.
