“There is nothing wrong with my degree,” AAP leader Jitender Singh Tomar said on Wednesday. Tomar quit as Delhi law minister after his arrest on Tuesday and claims to have done his BSc from RML Avadh University, Faizabad. Police are taking him there for an on the spot verification and questioning.
“My degree is absolutely genuine. It is a conspiracy by BJP and the central government. They are not letting AAP government work,” he told reporters on Wednesday morning at the railway station in Lucknow from where he was being taken to Faizabad by road. He was being escorted by an ACP level officer along with seven other personnel to Faizabad.
Delhi Police has claimed that a nearly month-long investigation found that Tomar not only submitted fake science graduation degree and law mark sheets to register with the Bar Council of Delhi but forged a migration certificate also.
Investigators said that an FIR was registered and Tomar was arrested only after finding concrete evidence of his wrongdoing following a complaint by Bar Council of Delhi Secretary Punit Mittal on May 11.
Once police received the complaint, a preliminary enquiry, as per the directives of the Supreme Court, was launched and two teams were sent to verify the documents attached with the complaint to RML Avadh University, Faizabad and Tilak Manjhi Bhagalpur University in Bihar.
The arrest episode adds to the drama over powers in Delhi administration. Amidst the ongoing turf war, chief minister Arvind Kejriwal is likely to meet Lt Governor Najeeb Jung on Wednesday. The AAP has accused the Centre of trying to destablilise the Delhi government.
The AAP government and Jung continued their fight over the appointment of ACB chief and an official who issued the order appointing Delhi Police Joint Commissioner MK Meena to the probe agency.
Stung by the arrest, AAP unleashed a stinging attack on the Modi government accusing it of political vendetta and creating an "Emergency-like" situation in Delhi to avert the city government's crackdown on corruption. AAP also alleged that the arrest "conspiracy" was hatched in the Union Home Minister's office at the behest of prime minister Narendra Modi and the party would not be cowed down but fight back.
"Tomar was arrested as if he was a mafia. Was he running away? Did he set off a bomb? What was the emergency, especially when a scam is being reopened? There's a deep underlying reason behind his arrest. "This is an attempt to teach AAP a lesson. We would not spare anyone who will come in the way of our fight against corruption. His college affidavit clearly states that he has passed his law degree," Delhi deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia said.
Both BJP and Congress demanded resignation of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal taking moral responsibility.
Meanwhile, the Bar Council of Delhi (BCD), which had complained to Delhi Police against Jitender Tomar, has questioned Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal for favouring his law minister.
BCD chairman, K K Manan denied any "political vendetta" behind its move. "Why is the chief minister favouring the minister despite our prima facie findings against him in the inquiry?
"If his degrees are genuine, why has the minister has not given us the documents till date? What presumption would be drawn from it," asked the chairman, pointing out that first the Delhi high court and later BCD repeatedly gave time to Tomar to prove his degrees were valid.
It was a petition filed in Delhi HC by advocate Santosh Kumar Sharma four days before the Delhi assembly elections that set in motion events which culminated on Tuesday with Tomar's arrest.
