ED at work in poll-bound states

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) which has been busy with its raids and investigations in many states in the past many months has got especially active in states where Assembly elections are due. Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Telangana, states where elections are to be held this month, have seen heightened ED action. From the point of view of impact, the arrest of West Bengal minister Jyoti Priya Mallick in connection with an alleged ration scam may have scored high because he was the fourth serving minister of the Mamata Banerjee cabinet to be arrested. The actions in the other states have raised concerns that they are intended to influence elections, especially because the Opposition is expected to do well in these states. The Congress is well placed in all the states and the question that has been raised is whether the ED is supporting and strengthening the election campaign of the BJP by acting against Opposition leaders. 

The premises of Rajasthan Congress president Govind Singh Dotasra, who is also an MLA and a candidate in the forthcoming elections, and those of another Congress candidate, Om Prakash Hudla, were raided by the ED last week. The raids were in connection with a case of question papers leaking in an examination for selection of teachers. Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot’s son Vaibhav Gehlot was summoned to Delhi for questioning in an alleged foreign exchange violation case. In Telangana, Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao’s daughter K Kavitha’s alleged role in the Delhi liquor scam case was under the lens, and in Madhya Pradesh, an old bank fraud case against Congress leader Kamal Nath’s nephew Ratul Puri was revived. The ED also conducted searches at many locations in Chhattisgarh, including the premises of Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel’s political adviser Vinod Verma and two officers in his office. There were a series of raids and arrests with political linkages in the state in cases about payment of paddy incentive, coal levy commission, and illegal liquor sale.

All these happened in the last few weeks and days and the targets in all of them were Opposition politicians or those associated with them. The central government’s and the BJP’s argument is that the ED is an independent body and takes its own decisions. No-one would believe it. Another argument is that the agency is only pursuing cases of corruption, money-laundering and illegalities. But this does not answer the question why only Opposition politicians are targeted for raids and other coercive actions. It is bad if central investigative agencies are used for political purposes. It is worse if they are used in aid of the ruling party for electoral purposes.