AAP, BJP at war over Satyendar Jain’s arrest by ED; minister to be produced before court today

 The ED arrested Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain in a money laundering case on Monday, triggering a political slugfest that saw the AAP accusing the Centre of vendetta politics.

Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain was arrested by the ED in a money laundering case (PTI photo)

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the ruling BJP at the Centre were once again at loggerheads following the arrest of Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in a money laundering case.

Satyendar Jain was taken into custody under criminal sections of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) after a few hours of questioning on Monday.

While the BJP and the Congress welcomed the action against the AAP leader, Delhi’s Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia alleged vendetta politics and said Jain has been arrested in an eight-year-old "fake" case.

Here's a refresher on the latest developments in the case:

1. After questioning Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain, the ED arrested him citing he was "evasive" in his replies. Jain is now likely to be produced before a designated court on Tuesday.

2. The ED has alleged that Satyendar Jain was involved in hawala transactions with a Kolkata-based firm in 2015-16. A money laundering was registered by the financial probe agency based on an FIR filed by the CBI in August 2017 on charges of alleged possession of disproportionate assets (DA).

3. The agency alleged that Jain and his family set up four shell companies to launder Rs 11.78 crore in 2011-12 and Rs 4.63 crore in 2015-16. The Income Tax Department had also probed these transactions and issued an order attaching "benami assets" allegedly linked to Jain.

4. Taking to Twitter, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia claimed that Jain has been arrested as he is the AAP's in-charge for the Himachal Pradesh Assembly elections and the BJP is afraid of losing the polls.

"A fake case has been going on against Satyendar Jain for eight years. He has been called by the ED several times so far. The ED had stopped calling him for some time because it did not find anything against him. Now it has again started because he is the incharge of Himachal Pradesh elections," Sisodia said in a tweet in Hindi.

5. AAP MP Sanjay Singh claimed that soon after being appointed the AAP in-charge in poll-bound Himachal Pradesh, Jain was arrested by the ED in a "baseless" case to "defame" the party.

6. Delhi BJP chief Adesh Gupta said his party had raised the issue of "corruption" by the AAP and its leaders in the past. "Kejriwal always kept mum on corruption charges against his party leaders. The arrest of Jain by the ED has come days after an AAP minister was arrested and sacked in Punjab people want Kejriwal to speak about it," Gupta said.

7. Delhi Congress president Anil Kumar said Jain's arrest was a “right step” taken by the ED. "Jain should have been arrested much earlier. Kejriwal has been protecting him for years," Kumar said.

8. Interestingly, in February this year, AAP National Convenor Arvind Kejriwal claimed that he had learnt from sources that the ED was going to arrest Jain just before the Punjab Assembly elections and accused the Centre of targeting the AAP after realising the BJP "would lose" the polls.

9. Satyendar Jain, 57, is the minister for health, industries, power, home, urban development and water in the Arvind Kejriwal-led government in Delhi.

10. The Himachal Pradesh Assembly polls are slated for later this year. The AAP is looking to make inroads into the state after its landslide victory in Punjab earlier this year.