After Delhi Police, ED now enters the fray; claims AAP leader linked to PFI
New Delhi: Days after the Delhi Police tried to link Shaheen Bagh shooter Kapil Baisala to the ruling Aam Aadmi Party, the Enforcement Directorate has now claimed that its probe into the Popular Front of India has purportedly revealed links of AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh and one Congress leader to the organisation, which the agency has claimed funded anti-CAA protests in Uttar Pradesh. Curiously, the ED's claims have yet again been based only on correlation, according to the information made public.
The agency has said that PFI's Delhi President Mohammed Perwez Ahmed and other PFI members had attended several anti-CAA protests and that Ahmed had met with Sanjay Singh and been in touch with him over phone and WhatsApp. The agency also claimed that Ahmed was in touch
with Congress leader Udit Raj, who had last year switched from the BJP.
A highly placed source said that these "revelations" had been shared with the Ministry of Home Affairs, as were the earlier findings on PFI. However, the allegations which were made public by the agency came through an unsigned and undated typed document with a list of pointers.
After news of the allegations broke, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal said that the Bharatiya Janata Party government at the Centre had earlier used Delhi Police and was now using the ED to "defeat our work-based elections". He said, "They got Delhi Police to use their power. Now they've got ED this time to say something. I said earlier also that whoever it is should be punished and if it is someone from AAP then punishment should be double. There's 24 hours left, let's see what more ways the BJP will find to malign us."
Despite reports promptly linking the AAP leader to PFI and by extension to the anti-CAA protests, the ED's note that was made public does not mention why Ahmed was in touch with Singh or whether they were in contact with respect to any aspect of the anti-CAA protests. In fact, neither does the report clarify whether PFI's funds were used to fund the protests. The agency had earlier alleged that PFI had received cash deposits of around Rs 120.5 crore in 73 related bank accounts to fund anti-CAA protests. While the ED has said most deposits were made in cash and withdrawn in small amounts, it has not yet substantiated whether the organisation's funds were used in the protests or not. The PFI has rubbished these allegations and clarified that they meet with several politicians to discuss issues of importance.
In addition, the ED had also claimed that PFI had made payments to several senior advocates like Kapil Sibal, Indira Jaising and Dushyant Dave. However, both PFI and Sibal have said that the payments were made in 2017-18 as legal fees for the Hadiya case. Jaising denied having received any money from PFI.
The ED has also said that Ahmed is part of WhatsApp groups such as "Bheem Army Top-100" and "Unification of Muslim Leadership", but it does not mention whether these chat groups were in any way involved in any illegal activites.
