Bhopal: Back to active politics after a self-imposed exile of 15 years and marginalised within his own party, AICC general secretary Digvijaya Singh exhibited his political strength on Thursday as he courted arrest at a police station in Bhopal with his close aides and thousands of party workers by his side.
Cops at the TT Nagar police station, however, gave him in writing that no cognizable offence is registered against him, and hence, there was no question of arresting him.
Singh’s political stunt was in response to MP chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s recent remark at a rally where he said that the Congress leader often goes to meet families of slain terrorists and glorifies them, and even adds ‘Ji’ to their names. Many of his acts seem anti-national, he had said.
Singh, who is striving to stay in the limelight, used the comments as an opportunity to pit himself against Chouhan and started a rally from the Congress office in the city, leading thousands of supporters to the police station. The route was also packed with posters and hoardings in his support.
“I am a law abiding citizen and presented myself before the police so that they could arrest me if they have any evidence against me,” Singh said at police station. He said as there was no case against him, he would drag CM Shivraj Singh Chouhan to court over his “defamatory” remarks.
Later, with a tricolor waving by his side, Singh climbed a DJ truck parked at a nearby square and further attacked CM Chouhan. He accused CM Chouhan of not understanding the dignity of his constitutional post and leveling baseless allegations against him.
He said that senior BJP leaders, including Vikram Verma and Sundarlal Patwa, have earlier regretted leveling allegations against him and claimed former MP CM Uma Bharti persistently sends proposals for amicable settlement in a defamation case he filed against her.
The Congress co-ordination committee chairman dared CM Chouhan to file a defamation case against him as he openly accused him and his family of involvement in Vyapam scam, nutritious food scam, illegal sand mining and e-tendering anomalies.
He also dared Chouhan for an open debate on his ten years of rule against 15 years of achievements of the BJP government at any platform.
Congress vice-president Rameshwar Neekhra, who accompanied Singh, lodged a complaint against the CM and urged police to book him under. He said that the responsibility of any violent backlash from the supporters of Singh would be on Chouhan.
Senior Congress leaders Jyotiraditya Scindia and Kamal Nath, however, maintained their distance from the whole affair, which literally turned into a show of strength for Singh, who was recently relieved of his charge in Goa, Telanagna and Karnataka and was axed from the new look Congress Working Committee under Rahul Gandhi.
Though Kamal Nath flagged off the rally from Congress office on Thursday, he did not become part of it as speculated earlier.
“Following series of personal attacks on each other, the mega show of strength would further make it political tussle a one-on-one battle between Singh and CM Chouhan,” opined a political analyst who wished anonymity.
Interestingly, Chouhan in his Jan Ashirwad Yatra has been targeting Digvijaya by flaying his ten years of ‘misrule’.
Comments
0 comment