Election Commission ‘helped’ AAP by delaying action, says Congress

New Delhi: The Election Commission “helped” the AAP by delaying its recommendation for disqualifying 20 of the party’s MLAs for holding offices of profit and enabled it in sending three candidates, including N.D. Gupta — a close associate of Union finance minister Arun Jaitley — to the Rajya Sabha, the Congress alleged on Saturday.

Delhi Congress chief Ajay Maken also tried to suggest that the BJP had a role in the delay, but offered no evidence.

“The EC on the instance of the BJP delayed its recommendation by a month and helped the Aam Aadmi Party. Had the recommendation come before the Rajya Sabha election, the AAP would have split due to internal rift,” Mr Maken claimed.

For the second day in a row, Mr Maken attacked the AAP after the EC recommended that 20 AAP legislators be disqualified for holding offices of profit. On Friday, Mr Maken had demanded Arvind Kejriwal’s resignation on moral grounds.

Today, he said the AAP faced opposition from within over its nominees for the Rajya Sabha and the party would have possibly split had the EC’s recommendation was announced last month when the party had decided the nominees.

“We want to ask Arvind Kejriwal about the connivance between him and the BJP, which was behind the delay in disqualification recommendation,” Mr Maken added.

Mr Maken added that the AAP’s claim that the 20 AAP MLAs, who were appointed as parliamentary secretaries to ministers, did not enjoy any “office-of-profit” proved to be a blatant lie. “Had there been any morality left in the 21 AAP MLAs, they would have resigned from their membership the moment the complaint was filed before the election commission on their issue of office-of-profit,” he said.