‘No guarantee how long he will stay out of jail': Smriti Irani on Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal

Taking a dig at Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Union Minister Smriti Irani said on Sunday, December 17, that there's no "guarantee on how long the Delhi Chief Minister can stay out of jail.”

Smriti Irani was speaking at the 'Naveen Shahdara Jila Karyakarta Sangam' in Delhi, and she said, "...I know you (BJP leader Manoj Tiwari) and the District president have no expectations from the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government...The person who has already sent half of his Cabinet to jail, there is no guarantee on how long he (Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal) will stay out..."

Three Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leaders, including Satyendar Jain, Manish Sisodia, and Sanjay Singh, are currently in jail after being arrested by central probe agencies in different cases. While AAP senior leaders Manish Sisodia and Sanjay Singh were arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in an alleged Delhi liquor scam this year, former Delhi minister Satyendar Jain was arrested in the month of May last year in a money laundering case.

Meanwhile, ED had also summoned Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for questioning in connection with the now-scrapped excise policy but Kejriwal chose not to appear before the agency. He claimed that the ED summon was illegal and motivated politically.

“Simultaneous to the summons, in the afternoon of 30.10.2023, BJP leaders started making statements that soon I would be summoned and arrested. By the evening of that day, I received your summons," said Kejriwal after receiving an ED summons in November.

Arvind Kejriwal was also questioned by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in April this year in connection with the alleged liquor scam. Kejriwal addressed the press after his over nine-hour questioning at the CBI headquarters in Delhi and informed the media that the central probe agency asked him 56 questions. 

"CBI questioning was conducted for 9.5 hours. I answered all the questions. The entire alleged liquor scam is false and bad politics. AAP is 'kattar imaandaar party'. They want to finish AAP, but the country's people are with us," Kejriwal said at the time.

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