Congress rallies behind Arvind Kejriwal in Delhi, but in Punjab some take aim at him

The top Congress leadership on Friday united in its condemnation of the arrest of AAP supremo and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, taking to the streets of the national capital in protest. But the party is not speaking in one voice and this is most visible in Punjab where the Congress is the principal Opposition to the AAP government led by Bhagwant Mann.

State Congress president Amrinder Singh Raja Warring said, “We are totally against vendetta politics, whether it happens in Punjab or at the national level. Using investigative agencies like CBI, ED, and Vigilance Bureau as a tool to target Opposition leaders will only weaken our democratic process.”

Congress MLA Sukhpal Khaira, who was arrested by the Punjab Police in connection with a 2015 case, on Friday said Kejriwal “deserved” the arrest. “I hope Arvind Kejriwal has got a befitting answer from the ED, which has called him the ‘kingpin’ of the (Delhi) liquor scandal. He had made fraudulent allegations against me and called me a smuggler on public platforms when I was in jail,” he said.

Khaira added, “These fake revolutionaries inflicted false criminal cases against their opponents in Punjab and surpassed the brutality of BJP. The saying — you reap whatever you sow — applies to Arvind Kejriwal. He and his team have been branding politicians like us and arresting them. The kattar imaandar (the staunch and faithful) has been arrested in a corruption case. Hope people are able to see his real face.”

Former Congress minister Bharat Bhushan Ashu also spoke similarly and said he was calling “a spade a spade”. Ashu, a former food and civil supplies minister, was arrested on August 22, 2022 in an alleged corruption case related to the transportation of food grains. He got