 "DDCA probe: Centre says illegal, Kejriwal says only court order can stop it")
The latter, through the Lt Governor’s office, has stated the notification for the probe is “unconstitutional and illegal”. Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has said the commission “will continue work” and the LG or the Centre can petition a court. “Only a court order can stop the commission’s work,” he had said.
The Aam Aadmi Party government has been maintaining from the time it constituted the probe on December 22 that the Centre will try to stop this in some way, in the interest of protecting Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who was head of DDCA some years before and against whom the CM has made several allegations.
The Kejriwal government’s probe is headed by senior advocate Gopal Subramanium. It is to look into the alleged wrongdoing in DDCA during the period when Jaitley was heading it. The latter has filed a charge of defamation against Kejriwal and other AAP leaders.
The AAP had backed Kirti Azad, a Lok Sabha member who’s been suspended from the Bharatiya Janata Party, for making like allegations on DDCA.
Kejriwal is in Kolkata, attending the Bengal Global Business summit; he took to micro blogging site Twitter to state, “DDCA enquiry commission...is as per law and Constitution of India. Centre’s opinion not binding on Del govt. Commission will continue work...Only a court order can stop (it).”
The LG in a letter had communicated that the Union home ministry had decided the notification in question was "unconstitutional, illegal and, therefore, has no legal effect". The Centre said the elected city government had no power to set up a probe under the Commission of Inquiry Act, given the provisions in Articles 239 and 239AA of the Constitution (which detail Delhi's legal status).
Kejriwal had claimed the recent Central Bureau of Investigation raid on one of his officers at the city secretariat was due to the Centre's wish to lay its hands on the DDCA probe file.