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Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's Principal Secretary Rajendra Kumar was among five persons arrested by the Central Bureau of Investigation on Monday in a graft case, sparking a vicious attack by a livid the Aam Aadmi Party on the Centre, accusing Prime Minister Narendra Modi of taking revenge for Delhi poll loss.
As the arrests over allegedly showing undue favours to a private company in award of government contracts worth over Rs 50 crore triggered a full-blown confrontation between the Centre and the AAP, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said never has any central government "stooped to such low level".
The Centre was also accused of "political vendetta" and "paralyzing" governance in Delhi. "Mr Modi, even if you only leave us with just peons, we will run the government with them," Sisodia said.
Kumar, a 1989 IAS officer of UT cadre, was called along with Tarun Sharma, a Deputy Secretary in Kejriwal's office, besides three other private persons for questioning at the CBI headquarters.
After being questioned for half a day, the CBI decided to place the two officers under arrest along with a close aide of Kumar, Ashok Kumar and owners of a private firm Sandeep Kumar and Dinesh Gupta.
The CBI had registered a case against Kumar and others in December last year alleging that the officer had abused his official position by "favouring a particular firm in the last few years in getting tenders of Delhi government departments".
The charges pressed by the CBI are under sections 120-B of IPC (criminal conspiracy), and 13(2), 13(1)(d) of the Prevention of Corruption Act (Criminal conspiracy, criminal misconduct etc) for allegedly favouring a private company --Endeavour Systems Pvt. Ltd.-- in bagging five contracts.
The CBI alleged that the accused persons had entered into a criminal conspiracy and caused a loss of Rs 12 crore to the Delhi government in award of contracts between 2007 and 2015, and claimed that the officials had taken "undue benefit" of over Rs three crore while awarding the contract.
"The CBI has arrested five persons including a senior civil servant, the government of Delhi, another official of the Delhi government, two directors of a Delhi-based private company and a private person.
"The allegations relate to bribery and abuse of official position by the said senior civil servant and others to favour a Delhi based private company in award of contracts of Delhi government," CBI's Chief Press Information officer R K Gaur said, adding the arrested accused persons will be produced before court on Tuesday.
"There is a conspiracy to paralyze the CM office. Principal Secretary and Deputy Secretary to CM have been arrested while Assistant secretary was transferred to Andaman.
"All has happened in just one day...this is the lowest levels to which a Central government has stooped, from the time Delhi has had an elected government in 1991," Sisodia told reporters.
"Prime Minister Narendra Modi is taking revenge of his party defeat in Assembly elections from the people of Delhi by arresting, transferring our officers and creating hurdles in our works, but we are not scared of these things," he added.
Sisodia earlier had tweeted, "Modi ji, let me tell you we've been elected by ppl of Delhi, we shall run an effective govt for them despite all your attacks on us! (sic)."
Senior AAP leader Ashutosh called the arrest of Kumar as "political vendetta" and attacked Modi, questioning whether he hates Pakistan more or the AAP.
The CBI claimed said that bribe worth Rs 3.3 crore was paid to the accused through fake work orders relating to various computerisation related work and for supply of software and hardware.
The agency alleged that Kumar had been favouring the company all through his earlier stints in various departments under the Delhi government.
Kumar while working as Chairman-cum-Managing Director of Delhi Transco Ltd got a pay roll system developed through the accused persons' firm despite the fact that it was already in place by Noida-based Centre for Development of Advanced Computing and spent Rs 47 lakh on it.
It was an unnecessary expenditure, the CBI claimed.
Kumar while working as Secretary health from July 2010 to April 2011, as Commissioner in Trade and Taxes department (also known as VAT department) from May 2011 to October 2012, and then as Secretary in Urban Development department from March 2014 and till last year allegedly favoured the firm with the connivance of Ashok Kumar for unlawful gain to all of them, they said.
Ashok Kumar is Rajendra's school mate and was a former Delhi government official who later resigned and allegedly conspired with Kumar to cheat the government.
This is the same case in which CBI had come under scathing criticism from court which directed it to return documents sought by the Delhi government seized during December 15, 2015 raids on Kejriwal's office.
"The CBI cannot retain the documents in the garb of the argument that investigation is in progress without whispering the fact in what manner they are related to the present case (against principal secretary Rajendra Kumar).
"The acceptance of vague reasons like investigation is still in progress implies that CBI is recognised with unbridled power to investigate even in violation of the relevant laws and regulations," Special CBI Judge Ajay Kumar Jain had said in his order in January this year.
The case was registered on a complaint from former Delhi Dialogue Commission member Ashish Joshi to the Delhi government's anti-corruption branch earlier last year. The complaint was forwarded to CBI in July last following which the agency registered an FIR after a five-month probe.
According to the CBI, the five contracts were allegedly awarded to Endeavour Systems when Kumar was holding various posts in the Delhi government and include a project for the development of a comprehensive management system to Endeavour Systems without any tendering process.
The CBI alleged that as Secretary, Health, in the Delhi government, Kumar facilitated the award of a manpower project to the firm without inviting tenders.
The CBI claimed, as commissioner, trade and taxes, Kumar helped the firm bag a contract for development of software applications for his department.
He was also accused of committing irregularities in award of contract for a facility management system for the trade and taxes department. As secretary to the Chief Minister, he allegedly facilitated the award of Delhi Jal Board contract for enterprise resource planning to the firm.