(New Delhi) India’s Supreme Court on Friday ordered the release on bail of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, one of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s main opponents, so that he can participate in the ongoing general elections.
Justices Sanjiv Khanna and Dipankar Datta granted Mr. Kejriwal bail until 1er June, the last day of a six-week election, according to an AFP journalist present in court.
Nearly a billion Indians were called to take part in the vote from April 19 to April 1er June, to choose a new government, constituting the largest democratic exercise in the world.
Many political analysts consider Mr. Modi’s victory to be a given, particularly because of the popularity of his Hindu nationalist policies, the country’s religious majority.
Arvind Kejriwal, the chief minister of the capital Delhi and a key leader of an opposition alliance formed to rival Mr. Modi in these elections, was arrested and detained in March on March 21 by India’s top enforcement agency. against financial crime.
Aged 55, Mr. Kejriwal is one of the leaders of the Indian opposition coalition INDIA, with Rahul Gandhi at the head of the Congress party, to compete with Mr. Modi.
“Tackling opponents”
Mr. Kejriwal’s government is accused of receiving bribes in the awarding of alcohol sales licenses to private companies.
But according to his supporters, the arrest of Mr. Kejriwal, who denies the accusations against him, aims to sideline the opponents of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
One of them called the affair a “political conspiracy” orchestrated by the ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
Rallies in support of Kejriwal were held in many other major Indian cities following his arrest.
Chief minister for almost a decade, he first took office as a staunch advocate of the fight against corruption. He had resisted several summons to be questioned as part of the investigation.
Mr. Kejriwal is one of several opposition leaders to be the subject of a criminal investigation.
Like Rahul Gandhi, 53 – whose father, grandmother and great-grandfather were all prime ministers – who was briefly removed from Parliament last year after being convicted of defamation.
He accuses the government of a certain democratic backsliding and criticizes its support for India’s majority faith, to the detriment of significant minorities worried about their future, including 210 million Muslim Indians.
Rights activists and the opposition accuse Mr. Modi’s government of exploiting justice for political ends and worry about the shrinking democratic space in India.
According to the American think tank Freedom House, the BJP “has increasingly used government institutions to attack political opponents.”
reference: www.lapresse.ca