JOIN USDelhi Cantonment legislator Surender Singh of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was arrested on Friday in a case related to assaulting a Dalit NDMC employee.
His driver and secretary have also been arrested.
Singh confirmed his arrest and said that police have informed him that he will be “taken for a medical check-up”.
The arrest, which followed Singh’s questioning for over an hour at the Tughlak Road police station in central Delhi, invited stinging criticism from Singh’s partymen who dubbed the development as victimisation of the ruling party legislators by “Modi police”.
Singh, a former National Security Guard commando, was arrested under charges of obstructing public servant in discharge of public functions, Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act and assaulting a public servant, police said.
The AAP was quick to react to the MLA’s arrest. “The nation, including people of Bihar, are watching the way our MLAs are being framed in false cases,” senior AAP leader Ashutosh told the media..
He also took to Twitter and said: “Modi govt protects corrupts of CNG Fitness scam and arrests patriot commando Surender who faced bullets of terrorists during 26/11 attack.”
The AAP leader said the Central government-controlled Delhi Police was targeting legislators of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s party as Prime Minister Narendra Modi was trying to settle scores over the BJP’s loss in the Assembly elections.
Earlier, New Delhi Municipal Council vice-chairperson Karan Singh Tanwar of the BJP alleged Surender Singh was terrorising all the departments and encouraging them to conduct raids to extort money.
“Singh extorts lakhs of rupees from all NDMC departments every month. When a council employee refused to succumb to his demands, he attacks the employees,” said Tanwar.
The AAP legislator was booked earlier this month for allegedly manhandling an NDMC worker.
Tanwar also wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Rajnath Singh to ensure that Singh did not go scot-free in the case.
Tanwar — a three-time former BJP MLA from the Delhi Cantonment Assembly constituency — was defeated by Surender Singh in the last elections. The BJP leader has also filed a plea against Singh in the Delhi High Court alleging that he has a fake graduation degree.
NDMC sanitary inspector Ram Jeevan Meena alleged in the first week of August that Singh made casteist remarks against him and his driver punched an NDMC employee named Mukesh Kumar in his face. Meena, along with his team, was carrying out an anti-encroachment drive against unauthorised vendors when the incident took place.