ACB questioned me for 3 hours on 3-paragraph note: Sisodia

Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia was questioned for three hours by the Centre-controlled Anti-Corruption Branch on Friday over the alleged recruitment scam at the Delhi Commission for Women.

Slamming the interrogation process, Sisodia said that the questioning by the ACB was a mere "tactic" to stall the AAP government from carrying out development work.

"I was questioned for nearly three hours by the ACB today. I kept asking what is my crime, but didn't get any answer," said Sisodia. Last week, Sisodia was given a summon by the ACB to appear before the anti-graft unit.

"When I was being questioned I was wondering what irregularities the ACB has found in my departments that it has called me in an unprecedented manner for questioning me," said Sisodia. "The three-hour questioning was based on a three-paragraph note that I had written to the DCW in March," he added.

The DCW had sought a clarification from the finance department whether a member secretary at the DCW had any financial powers. "So I replied that the finance department is of the opinion that the member secretary had administrative and financial powers under the act the DCW was formed in 1994," said Sisodia, who also hold finance portfolio. "Is giving clarification such a big crime that a deputy chief minister is questioned over it for three hours," he added.

Sisodia said he kept asking the ACB sleuths what have they found against him, but in vain. "I kept asking ACB officials what is my offence. You have called a deputy chief minister who is also the finance minister. Tell him his crime. But they didnt have any answer to that," he said.

In all three AAP ministers have been called by the ACB for interrogation. "What is this going on. Actually the thing is that the AAP government has done so much work in the past one and a half years which the previous governments could not even do in the last 20 years," said Sisodia. "AAP ministers have worked 24x7 for carrying out development work. So these ACB probe or CBI inquires are nothing but mere tactics to stall the AAP government from taking welfare measures for the people," he added.

Earlier, the ACB had registered an FIR against Delhi Commission for Women (DCW) chairperson Swati Maliwal over the irregularities on a complaint of former DCW chief Barkha Shukla Singh. Singh, member of Congress, had alleged that AAP supporters were being appointed to the DCW.

The ACB had included the name of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in the FIR. However, the Anti-Corruption Branch later said that it did not find anything incriminating against Kejriwal. But the AAP government called a special session of the Delhi Assembly to “expose the conspiracy hatched by the Prime Minister’s Office to include Chief Minister’s name in the FIR”.

Two days after the ACB had registered the FIR against her, Maliwal alleged corruption and financial bunglings by former chairpersons of the DCW during 2007 to 2015 “on the directions of the then chief minister Sheila Dikshit”.