PM Modi’s corruption fight call may push agencies into top gear | India News

NEW DELHI: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s appeal for popular support for the fight against corruption coincides with indications of investigations entering a crucial phase in politically sensitive and high profile cases.
Modi’s statement that the battle against corruption is about to enter a crucial phase and he was determined to take it to its logical end followed Enforcement Directorate disregarding Congress’s shrill protests to complete its investigation of Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi in the National Herald case, its haul of an obscene amount of cash from the residences of senior Trinamool Congress leader and then West Bengal minister Partha Chatterjee and CBI’s arrest of another TMC leader Anubrata Mondal.

Just before that CBI had arrested Bhola Yadav, Bihar MLC and a close aide to Lalu Prasad, in connection with the sensational “land-for job” scam pertaining to the RJD strongman’s tenure as railway minister.
The run-up, more important, saw the Supreme Court dismissing the challenges to ED’s powers under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act on grounds of being violative of the principle of presumption of innocence and that the process, with a high bar for giving bail, could turn into punishment.
The court verdict would have, in any case, spurred the investigations which were stalled because of the challenge pending in the court and with the court passing “protection from coercive action” orders in several cases.
But with the Prime Minister framing the issue as an ‘influential and corrupt rich versus poor’ fight and citing the savings worth Rs 2 lakh crore achieved through digital transfer of benefits, the investigators are set to step up on the pedal more assuredly. The last few weeks had seen opposition parties raising the issue of alleged selective targeting of political opponents in a big way. While Congress hit the streets, Shiv Sena and Trinamool Congress accused the central agencies of acting as organs of the party in office.
When JD(U) dumped BJP to go back to RJD, leaders of the newly forged ruling alliance in Bihar flung an open challenge at CBI and ED to come for them. “We will offer them space to set up their offices,” an important RJD leader said.
The PM’s speech suggested that the fear of political resistance would not lead him to stop the investigations. Rather, Modi saying that he would take the issue to the people may encourage the agencies to push the gear.