Excise Policy Case: Why Manish Sisodia's Prolonged Incarceration Should Worry Us

Sisodia is in jail because he has been charged under the PMLA, under which the process is itself the punishment.

Manish Sisodia is in jail because he has been charged under a draconian law, the PMLA, under which the process is itself the punishment.

(Photo: Namita Chauhan/The Quint)

Manish Sisodia’s incarceration and character assassination without trial are manifestly unjust. In the last few days, the media has been flushed with stories of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) seizing over Rs 52 crore worth of properties belonging to Sisodia and others. This claim is deliberately misleading as it sought to portray him as the beneficiary of a large amount of ill-gotten wealth, whereas, according to the details of the ED seizure memo (accessed by the Aam Aadmi Party), Sisodia’s property amounted to just Rs 81.5 lakh.

In how the Rs 81.5 lakh of reality becomes Rs 52 crore in manipulated propaganda lies a story of a vicious witch-hunt that must worry us all.

When Process Itself is the Punishment

Ordinarily, a leader is often subjected to allegations, fair and unfair, by opponents. Often enough, investigations by opponents are par for the course. But what Sisodia has faced is much worse and harmful to a democracy.

First, he has been jailed for over four months without conviction.

The citizens of Delhi have not been deprived of their best education minister, and Manish Sisodia has not been robbed of his liberty, because he has been tried and found guilty by any court of law. He is in jail because he has been charged under a draconian law, the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002 (PMLA), under which the process is itself the punishment.

The PMLA creates a presumption of guilt, and the scope for granting bail is extremely narrow.

These draconian measures were meant to target terrorism and narcotics, but the exceptions from procedural safeguards carved out for them are now being exploited and misused by the Narendra Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government against political opponents, in this case Sisodia.

To understand the unfairness of it all, assume the court finds Sisodia to be innocent in the future. He still would have lost many months – or maybe years of liberties – because the investigative agency didn’t conclude the investigation in time and used the investigation as a tool to keep him jailed.

Second, the seizure memo again reveals that what Sisodia is facing is persecution, not prosecution. The properties that have been seized were all publicly declared by him and obtained much before the alleged liquor policy irregularities took place.

Yet, they have been seized as proceeds of crime. The intent seems to be to economically strangle Sisodia's ailing wife. This is just the latest in a series of actions revealing the viciousness and bias of the ED. The agency fought tooth and nail to deprive her of Sisodia's presence, made claims of Rs 52 core asset seizure, and none other than the government’s top lawyer, Tushar Mehta, fought for the ED against his bail.

The government even brought in an ordinance overruling the Supreme Court services judgment to keep control of the vigilance department – and use the department to aid the ED’s witch-hunt.

Third, the witch-hunt is not just confined to abusing the regime’s enforcement machinery – the ED, its law officers, its power to bring ordinances, and the administrative machinery of the Delhi government – but extends to character assignment through the use of the national media to malign Sisodia and make people believe in his guilt.

It is for anyone to see how a large section of the media, instead of finding and showing the truth, collaborates with the regime in misleading the public. 

Fourth, the witch hunt of Manish Sisodia, when compared with the kid gloves treatment afforded to those leaders facing ED or the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) investigations once they join the BJP, reveals the collapse of the rule of law under the prime minister.

While Sisodia is in jail without any proof of ill-gotten wealth, the ED and the CBI have put into cold storage the serious cases of corruption against the BJP’s Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sharma, its Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan, and its Leader of Opposition in West Bengal, Suvendu Adhikari.

The double standards make one wonder: Are there two sets of laws – one for those in the BJP and the other for those against it?

If the intent was to tackle corruption, then would not Sharma and Adhikari, whom the BJP itself alleged to be prime accused in the water supply scam and the Narada scam, respectively, be jailed? Instead, they have been made powerful functionaries, and all their investigations were dropped the moment they joined the party.

If Sisodia were a corrupt politician who only cared about power and money, he would have compromised and enjoyed the comforts of power like these leaders. He is in jail not because he is corrupt but because he isn’t. Let’s not shy away from the harsh truth of it all: Sisodia is a political prisoner. A prisoner of conscience.

Why Manish Sisodia?

The citizens, exhausted and confused by the deceits of politicians, may still ask – 'Why should they care even if Sisodia is being haunted?'

We all must care because Sisodia, the leader, is not being persecuted; it is Sisodia, the symbol, and an idea that are being persecuted. He symbolises an upright common man who dared to challenge and change the system.

The son of a school teacher and the journalist-turned-anti-corruption-activist turned Delhi’s deputy chief minister, who roomed the streets of Delhi, to visit schools each morning, to transform the state's education system.

He provided India with a roadmap on how to improve our public schools and prevent our human capital from turning into a burden.

In persecuting him, the regime is sending a message to each of us. It’s telling us that if a person as liked and respected as Sisodia can be jailed and maligned, then anyone else can be too.

The regime is trying to break an honest man for the sin of challenging a dishonest system. We all must ensure that another honest man doesn’t have to bow to a regime that crushes all alternatives to itself. Manish Sisodia cannot break, and Manish Sisodia will not break. If Manish Sisodia is broken, we all will be.

(Dilip Pandey is an MLA, Chief Whip (RP) in Delhi Assembly, Vice President of Delhi's state unit, and National Spokesperson of the Aam Aadmi Party. This is an opinion piece. The views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)