What's AAP? Manish Sisodia & Satyendar Jain in Jail, What Next if Party Chief Arvind Kejriwal is Arrested?

On April 11, a day after the election commission recognized ten-year-old Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) as a national party, National Convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, addressing supporters in the party’s 206, Rouse Avenue office, said, “Of the 1,300 political parties in the country, just six are national and of these, only three have governments in two or more states – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Congress and AAP….Be prepared for arrests…”

Less than a week following that address, Kejriwal was summoned by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) under section 160 of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC) for questioning as a witness in the alleged Delhi Excise Policy Scam.

On April 16, before the chief minister left for questioning, he tweeted a video message for his supporters and held a high-level closed-door meeting with Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann; the party’s cabinet ministers Kailash Gahlot, Saurabh Bhadwaj and Atishi; MPs Raghav Chadha and Sanjay Singh; and Delhi Assembly Speaker Ram Niwal Goel. It is widely believed that Kejriwal gave a hint of the party’s ‘plan B’ in the odd chance of his arrest on that day.

So, what are AAP’s options minus its top three – Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia and Satyendar Jain?

TENSE MOMENTS

Kejriwal left for his questioning accompanied by Mann, while a cavalcade of vehicles carrying AAP ministers and MPs followed the duo. Mann, the party’s ministers and MPs from Delhi and Punjab staged a sit-in protest less than a kilometer away from the fortified CBI headquarters, and except for Mann, were subsequently detained by the Delhi police and taken to a police station in Najafgarh.

With almost all top leaders detained, there were tense moments within the party as the questioning crossed eight hours. Even though Kejriwal was called in as a witness, in the backdrop of former Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia’s arrest by the CBI on February 26 and then by the ED, and former health minister Satyendar Jain’s arrest by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on May 31, 2022, there were tense moments.

Education Minister Atishi said, “We have risen fighting against corruption from these very streets of Delhi. You can’t scare us by sending ED or CBI notices.”

Asked if Kejriwal is actually arrested, what is the plan, Atishi said, “…If they arrest Arvind Kejriwal, they have no idea of the AAP leaders’ mettle…”

WHAT THE LAW SAYS

According to the law, a chief minister, while under arrest for interrogation, may continue to retain office until bail or acquittal. This position is not tenable practically or politically.

Former Bihar Chief Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav had resigned from his post after being named as an accused in the CBI charge sheet in 1997 in the fodder scam and made his wife Rabri Devi the chief minister of Bihar.

Kejriwal has not been named as an accused in the alleged Delhi Excise scam. In fact, both Jain and Sisodia continued to be ministers even after their arrests.

Section 8 (3) of the Representation of People’s Act, 1951 states: “A person convicted of any offence and sentenced to imprisonment for not less than two years [other than any offence referred to in sub-section (1) or sub-section (2)] shall be disqualified from the date of such conviction and shall continue to be disqualified for a further period of six years since his release.”

“It is a matter for the party, the party has to decide… The second thing, as far as the assembly is concerned, without CM, no problem at all, there is no law like that [the presence of the CM is mandatory], quorum must be completed,senior ministers must be there. The House can go on, that’s all,” remarked Goel when asked about the fallout of the eventuality of Kejriwal’s arrest.

WIFE OR ANOTHER MLA?

In case of his arrest, Kejriwal will move court for bail, failing which he may choose to resign, like Sisodia. In that case, the elected MLAs would meet to elect a new leader, someone who has the endorsement of the AAP chief. With the party’s number two and number three already in jail, and no other MLA matching the stature of the top three in the party, it is anybody’s guess who that MLA could be and whether the person can command the loyalty of the other MLAs.

The other option being talked about is Kejriwal’s wife Sunita, an ex-IRS officer, taking over and, subsequently contesting from a constituency. However, according to the AAP’s constitution, two people from the same family will not be given nomination to contest the elections. This provision has an exception — if two or more members of the same family join the party and they had contested elections prior to joining, the party may decide to give nominations to all such persons. Given these factors, and also that the AAP has been vocal against ‘dynastic politics’, nominating Sunita comes with its own hurdles and challenges.

SPLIT POSSIBLE?

Even though the AAP is vulnerable at the moment, with a majority of 62 in a house of 70, the numbers are in its favour. However, the AAP has gone to town with claims of the BJP’s foiled ‘Operation Lotus’, a claim denied by the latter and has also gone through the exercise of a headcount of its MLAs.

A majority of the MLAs in the party owe their electoral victories, their rise in politics to Kejriwal. Therefore, engineering a split in the party may not be easy, given that there is no second power centre yet who can galvanise the support of one-third of the elected members.

Asked if, as the AAP fears, Kejriwal’s arrest would make the party vulnerable to splitting, Atishi said, “Not at all. See the people who are sitting here. The Punjab Chief Minister is here, the Punjab cabinet is here, the Delhi cabinet is here, Rajya Sabha MPs of the party are here. You can see that all the leaders are standing solidly behind Arvind Kejriwal…”

THE CHALLENGES SO FAR

AAP and Kejriwal have gone through three serious challenges so far — first in 2014, post Kejriwal’s defeat in Varanasi when the AAP, with 28 MLAs in the Delhi assembly, tried unsuccessfully to enlist the support of the Congress again to form the government and Kumar Vishwas claimed to have the support of half a dozen MLAs. Vishwas, then a prominent face of the AAP, had also claimed that the BJP had reached out to him which the latter denied.

Second, post the party’s phenomenal win in 2015 with 67 of the 70 seats, when the challenge from Yogendra Yadav and Prashant Bhushan was nipped in the bud. Again, the duo did not have the support of any MLA except one and were ousted from the party.

And, third in 2017, post the party’s less than expected performance in Punjab and defeat in the MCD polls, but again Vishwas could not muster the support of MLAs leading to his ouster.

In all these instances, Kejriwal had Sisodia by his side to manage the internal power struggles and MLAs along with others who now have left the party. It would be largely up to crisis manager and MP Sanjay Singh and Delhi Convener Gopal Rai to keep th

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