Spokesperson: Dr. Abhishek Manu Singhvi: He said that this delegation (almost all political party in the Opposition) was activated late last night, not last night, late-late last night. Every possible political colour is represented from the Opposition here, at short notice.

Now, in the Election Commission, we pointed out that this is not a normal complaint. It is a larger issue of affecting, impairing, and undermining, sabotaging the basic structure of the Indian Constitution. We pointed out that a level-playing field is a heart and soul of free and fair elections. So, the moment you skew, you render the level-playing field into a non-level-playing field. How do you do it? You use and misuse agencies blatantly. Cases which are 20 years old, if you have to take action… I am assuming for a minute their action is justified… why can’t the action be deferred till June, July? What is the need to arrest him today? What is the need to raid him tomorrow… right on the cusp in the middle of elections! It is because you want to win by unfair means, before the first vote is cast.

Never before has it been that the other Chief Minister who had been forced to demit office a few days before that was also arrested from Jharkhand… never before... we have given a list of recent… I repeat recent only… eleven other examples. Every party of this political spectrum standing here has been harassed, raided and arrested. Why?

We asked this question to the mega policeman and custodian of our democracy… the Election Commission. We told them that you have Constitutional powers. If you can appoint DGPs, if you can appoint Heads of police, you can change Home Secretary… just now… one week ago, then why can’t you control the appointments to the ED, the CBI and the IT during at least the period which is known commonly as the hot period or the MCC period.

That is absolutely no exemption. They are also statutory agencies; they are also executive agencies. You cannot allow agencies to act in a non-neutral, discriminatory fashion, and so on and so forth. – Friday, March 22, 2024