© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
Tags:
Journalism of Courage
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)’s Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh walked out of Tihar Jail Wednesday, a day after he was granted bail by the Supreme Court in the Delhi excise policy case. Reeling from the arrest of its senior leaders, including its supremo and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, in the same case, the AAP has got a shot in the arm on the eve of the Lok Sabha elections by Sanjay Singh’s release. In an interview with The Indian Express, Singh spoke on a range of issues, including his party’s poll campaign, the INDIA bloc, the elevation of Kejriwal’s wife Sunita, and his nearly six-month-long incarceration. Excerpts:
AAP is contesting on 23 seats as part of the INDIA alliance. Our focus will be to ensure that all our workers make efforts with full dedication in areas where we are contesting. Where we are not contesting, our workers will help in the campaign of the INDIA bloc candidates.
There are 3-4 big issues right now. The first is the looming danger to democracy. Elected governments are being brought down and MLAs and ministers are being bought. Chief Ministers (of Opposition parties) are being jailed. This has to be explained to the people, and how there is an attempt to finish any Opposition.
The other big issues include inflation, farmers’ distress, unemployment, Agniveer scheme. We will bring these to the people. I believe Modi ji will lose the 2024 elections. So far, whenever they have spoken about winning, they have fallen. In West Bengal, they said they will get over 200 seats. What happened? In Mizoram, they said they will get 21 seats, they got 1. In Haryana, they said they will go past the 75 mark, they got 40… BJP’s slogan of crossing the 400 mark will fall flat.
People are troubled by price rise. Over 82 crore people in this country are surviving on 5 kg ration and you are giving the nation’s property to just one person. You have waived loans amounting to Rs 15 lakh crore of a select few businessmen.
There is another indication (that BJP will lose); their support reached a saturation point in 2019, it will only decrease now. There was no alliance at that time, today there is. No leader would arrest CMs ahead of elections. This is also an indication of frustration (in the BJP). This is going to be a very interesting election. Their campaign will not translate into reality and their slogan of crossing the 400 mark will prove to be a lie, just like their other slogans.
I think there is a need for a common minimum programme (CMP), wherein it is made clear that these are 5 or 10 or 20 things that will be done if we are voted to power. In the campaign strategy, there is a need to fully support other allies. It should not happen that where AAP is not contesting, its workers do not help the other party and if Congress is not contesting, their workers won’t campaign.
I am not commenting on that right now. I am saying that all INDIA parties should help each in the campaign and each party worker should work to ensure a win.
Also, the speed at which a lie is being spread, the answer should be as quick. Somewhere, BJP is a master at this. They prepare a false narrative and, like Hitler’s chief propagandist Joseph Goebbels who said that a lie, if repeated a hundred times, becomes the truth, repeat it a hundred times. We need to have a strategy to counter the lies quicker.
Nitish Kumar ji’s departure was completely unexpected. He was going from one place to another to bring Opposition parties together, and he suddenly joined NDA. Switching sides in this manner impacts your image. You may be able to get power and some benefits in the short term. But if you switch sides over and over again, history will not judge you kindly. You can be remembered either as a coward or as courageous. We have to decide what we want to be remembered as. I don’t think those who once spoke out against the BJP and have now bowed down before it will be remembered well.
To this day, one of the lasting images from Hitler’s Germany is of the man who did not raise his hand in a show of allegiance. Why? Because people like it… you have to show courage sometimes. For how long will you be scared? Today, 14 former Congress CMs are in the BJP. Modi ji used to say that he will build a Congress-mukt Bharat, now he says they will make a Congress-yukt BJP.
She is doing everything possible to stand against BJP. She is not with BJP. There is a world of difference between her and Nitish Kumar. Nitish ji bowed down in front of BJP, and Mamata ji is fighting against it. The results in Bengal will be good… The INDIA bloc will surely benefit from it.
The first thing for us is to tell the people about the deep-rooted conspiracy which has resulted in the arrest of Arvind Kejriwal. There are 162 ED witnesses and 294 witnesses in the CBI case in the excise policy cases. There are a total of 456 witness statements. Out of these only four people named Kejriwal. Their names are Magunta Reddy, Raghava Reddy, Sharath Reddy and C Aravind. How were these statements recorded?
A raid was conducted at Magunta Reddy’s house on September 16, 2022. On February 10, (2023), his son Raghava is arrested… Raghava gives seven statements till July 16, 2023. And his father gives three statements. Of these 10 statements, Kejriwal is not mentioned in eight. He is named in the last two statements. On July 16, as soon as Kejriwal is named, he gets bail on July 18. It is clear how agencies are being misused and conspiring against the CM… Under Section 50 of PMLA, you can’t give a false statement. A witness is told before giving a statement, under this Section, that if you give a false statement, action can be taken against you. You are an investigating agency. If you are gathering evidence or taking statements, you are doing it to prove us guilty. All those documents should be presented to the court, which will decide which statement is correct and which is not. Why did you hide it? Why did you put it in the unrelied-upon documents? These statements under Section 50, PMLA, are equivalent to statements before the magistrate. You hid the statements that were in our favour and shared the ones that were against us.
There are no seizures by the agencies. Now, Sharath Reddy’s house was raided in November 2022 and he is arrested. He gives 12 statements till April 25, 2023. He doesn’t name Kejriwal in 10 statements, only in the last two. As soon as he names Kejriwal, he gets bail after complaining of back pain. The man who was called the kingpin of the scam, gives Rs 55 crore to BJP (in electoral bonds), for which a money trail is available. The BJP takes Rs 55 crore from a kingpin; will the top BJP leadership not know about it. How many BJP leaders have been questioned?
As for C Aravind, he says that he gave a paper to the Deputy CM (Manish Sisodia) at the house of the CM. What does this prove? They talk about ethics. After having done all these unethical acts, they are asking us to follow ethics. This action is not against corruption but to break governments. We have said this repeatedly… the BJP is a master in planting a seed of doubt…
Congress should declare the names of their candidates soon so that the campaign can progress quicker… Our candidates are working, meetings and rallies are being held.
Her role is very prominent, and has grown, in terms of passing on the CM’s message to the people. The party has said officially that Arvind Kejriwal was, is and will remain the CM of Delhi. This was decided after speaking to the 2 crore people of Delhi… We will do whatever is needed to defeat the BJP, including her (Sunta’s) campaigning for candidates, even outside Delhi.
Books had a big impact on me. I got the chance to read a lot, more than I would have in six years. When I read Nelson Mandela, Gandhi ji, Bhagat Singh… I read about caste, Ambedkar ji, Lohiya ji and I felt that in comparison we are not going through much. I read a book called Kaala Paani ke Dastavez. It talks about the kind of torture our leaders had to face there, it is horrific. At the time, however, Bhagat Singh fought for justice even while he was inside jail. Jatin Das died after a long fast in jail. There are so many stories from that time that are very inspirational. We are also being tested.
