Indian politician arrested before election gets further detention

NEW DELHI: An Indian court renewed detention for key opposition leader Arvind Kejriwal until April 15 in a graft case, his lawyers said, less than three weeks before voting begins in general elections.

In a move that sparked protests last month, India’s financial crime-fighting agency arrested Kejriwal, the chief minister of Delhi, over graft accusations related to the city’s liquor policy and he was remanded to custody until on Monday (April 1).

On Monday, the court increased his detention. Opposition parties say the arrest, along with government action against other opposition groups and their leaders, shows the government is denying them a level playing field in the elections, charges it denies.

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Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) says he has been falsely arrested in a fabricated case, but Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) denies political interference.

Lawyers for the agency, the Enforcement Directorate, said on Monday that Kejriwal had been non-cooperative and gave evasive replies, asking the court to hold him in custody for 15 days longer, the website Live Law said.

The arrest of the high-profile leader set off protests in the capital and the northern state of Punjab, ruled by his party.

The court’s decision comes a day after a New Delhi rally by the INDIA bloc, an alliance of 27 opposition parties including AAP, to protest against Kejriwal’s arrest, where they accused Modi of seeking to rig the elections.

Regional groups are among the opposition parties also facing action by federal agencies, which they have called politically motivated.

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The main opposition Congress party has been hit with large income tax demands it described as a bid to cripple it financially before the elections, an accusation the BJP has denied.

On Monday, in a breather for Congress, tax authorities told the Supreme Court they would not pursue a demand for a tax payment of 35 billion rupees ($420 million) until after the elections.

The party has gone to court to challenge the tax demand, which is in addition to 1.35 billion rupees it has already paid.

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Arvind Kejriwal’s lawyer, Madan Lal said, “The ED (Enforcement Directorate) doesn’t want to keep him (Kejriwal) in its remand and question him further, they have requested the court to send him into judicial custody for the next 15 days since the investigation is ongoing…and it is a provision of the law that until the investigation is complete or bail is granted, no accused can be kept in jail for longer than 15 days. So, the court has sent him to jail for the next 15, rather, 14 days.”