: Don’t give clean chit to Sisodia but see the timing. A national scandal is being covered #WorldNEWSAll Was it necessary to arrest Manish Sisodia? Is his arrest justified by the standards adopted

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Don’t give clean chit to Sisodia but see the timing. A national scandal is being covered #WorldNEWSAll
Was it necessary to arrest Manish Sisodia? Is his arrest justified by the standards adopted by the present government in similar cases?
MY PHONE started ringing as soon as the news of Manish Sisodia’s arrest flashed. TV channels were extra keen on my byte. Given my history with the Aam Aadmi Party, they assumed that I would join the campaign seeking his resignation. Once he resigned, they assumed that I would join the well-orchestrated chorus about the moral and political fall of AAP. They were looking for a masala byte: ‘AAP founder castigates the party for moral degeneration’, or something along those lines.
I did not oblige. I am no fan of AAP or Manish Sisodia, I said, but I cannot possibly applaud or enjoy Sisodia’s arrest. First and foremost, I must condemn this arrest and the political drama surrounding it.
Yogendta Yadav, Arvind Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia A file pic
Over the last eight years after exiting AAP, I have tried not to spend disproportionate time and energy on critiquing my ex-colleagues. Once in a while, the situation forces me to respond, but I move on quickly. I find kiss-and-tell politics too boring. Besides, you can’t allow your ex to control your present life.
In this case, there was also a different and deeper reason for my response, not limited to my personal and political predilections. Focusing our attention and energies at this moment on the excise scam of AAP reflects a poor political judgment. It involves stepping into a well-laid diversionary trap. It amounts to politics of false moral equivalence that allows a run-of-the-mill scam to distract us from the biggest scandal of our time. It leads us to unwitting complicity in political hypocrisy and witch-hunt.
Why AAP’s excise policy stinks
An honest response to this situation need not brush aside the issue of excise policy or rush to give clean chit to AAP leaders. Sadly, this is what most opposition leaders have done while rightly condemning the arrest and detention of Manish Sisodia.
A simple-minded partisanship has overtaken principles in our public life. If you are with the BJP, or if your dislike for AAP overwhelms your opposition to the BJP, you believe the CBI charges, support Sisodia’s arrest and forecast a death for the AAP. If you are opposed to the current dispensation, you stand with AAP, give a clear chit to Sisodia, condemn his arrest and believe that the entire case is a fabrication. Political judgments need not be so innocent.
First of all, liquor policy is a serious business. I have argued in this column that liquor control is not about moral policing of a private pleasure. It is a grave issue involving high mortality, violence against women and economic distress of poor families.

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