The central agencies on Wednesday intensified their raids on people linked to the Rajasthan Congress, including the chief minister’s brother, as the Speaker approached the Supreme Court against the high court’s restraint on the proceedings to disqualify rebel Congress MLAs.
Assembly Speaker C.P. Joshi, initially agreeable to the high court’s request to delay his decision on the disqualification petitions, felt the judicial intervention was encroaching on his powers when the injunction was extended till Friday evening.
“The Speaker is well within his rights to decide on disqualification under the anti-defection law. Under the present circumstances, I should either relinquish my post or remain a mute spectator,” Joshi told a news conference on Wednesday morning.
“The judiciary can’t encroach upon the Speaker’s powers. I have decided to approach the Supreme Court because I don’t want a constitutional crisis.”
Senior advocate Mukul Rohatgi has filed a caveat in the Supreme Court on behalf of the Sachin Pilot group, seeking to be heard before the judgment is passed.
While the Congress move may have been prompted by fear that the high court might grant relief to the Pilot camp, any delayed resolution of the matter is also likely to encourage “horse-trading”.
Suggestions that five or six of its MLAs had escaped from their Hotel Fairmont safe house in Jaipur kept the Congress managers on their toes through the day.
The psychological pressure on the Ashok Gehlot government increased with the Enforcement Directorate raiding many people close to the chief minister, including his brother Agrasain Gehlot.
A Congress MLA, Krishna Punia, faced CBI questioning over a police inspector’s suicide in her constituency.
Gehlot did not react to the day’s developments but lawyer-politician Kapil Sibal, who will plead Joshi’s case in the Supreme Court on Thursday, appeared despondent.
“In my country, has the ‘Rule of Law’ become the law of ‘He who Rules’?” he tweeted.
“Custodial deaths, fake encounters, toppling elected governments (money +), intemperate language by the powerful, persecuting the innocent, highly questionable judicial verdicts. Save my country!”
Congress communications chief Randeep Surjewala accused the Centre of coercive tactics at a news conference in Jaipur.“Those sitting in power in Delhi have become so autocratic and so arrogant that they think they can trample on the people’s mandate anytime, in any state,” he said.
“When the conspiracy to topple the government through defections and money power failed, the Modi government unleashed central agencies on Congress leaders.”
Surjewala described the raids on Agrasain’s home as a desperate act of vindictiveness.
“Raids have already been conducted on Congress leaders Rajiv Arora, Dharmendra Rathod and Fairmont Hotel owner Ratan Sharma. They sent the CBI to terrorise our MLA Krishna Punia, who is an international sports celebrity,” he said.
“Then Gehlot’s OSD (officer on special duty) Dewaram was summoned for questioning. Finally, Gehlot’s brother, who is not in politics. The ED team reached there with the CRPF only to scare him.”
Surjewala declared: “Modiji, you have unleashed a raid raj in the country. Your allies – ED, CBI, income tax —won’t be able to achieve your political objective. Your machinations may have succeeded in other states but will fail in Rajasthan. Try all your oppressive, coercive tricks; we will... defeat your evil designs.”
