Out on bail, firebrand Indian politician poses fresh challenge for Modi

Chief minister of the capital Delhi and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal (R) and Punjab's chief minister Bhagwant Mann (L) address supporters at a roadshow in Amritsar on May 16, 2024, ahead of the fifth phase of voting in Indiaís general election. (AFP)
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Updated 17 May 2024
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Out on bail, firebrand Indian politician poses fresh challenge for Modi

  • Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party is in power in the Delhi region and in the northern state of Punjab, which together account for just 20 seats in parliament, out of the 543 being contested

NEW DELHI: Firebrand Indian politician Arvind Kejriwal has hit the ground running since his surprise release from detention in the midst of a contentious general election, energizing the opposition as it challenges Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The Supreme Court gave 55-year-old Kejriwal, who is also the chief minister of the national capital territory of Delhi, bail in a graft case on May 10 and he wasted no time in getting on the campaign trail.
“I have only one request from you; we all have to come together to save the country from dictatorship. I am fighting this dictatorship with all my might,” he told a jubilant crowd soon after walking out of Delhi’s Tihar jail, clearly referring to Modi.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Delhi voters have mixed reactions to his campaign.

• Kejriwal will generate sympathy but victory unsure, analysts say.

Kejriwal is part of the INDIA alliance led by the Congress Party and one of its biggest crowd-pullers. Analysts say while his campaigning will give fresh impetus to the opposition, they are unsure if that will translate into any significant victories against the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, which is tipped to return to power.
Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party is in power in the Delhi region and in the northern state of Punjab, which together account for just 20 seats in parliament, out of the 543 being contested.
“He may be able to generate some sympathy vote, but would that be enough to change the outcome of the election?” said Rahul Verma, a fellow at the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research think tank.
“The BJP led in Delhi by 20 percentage points on an average in each seat, so it needs a substantial amount of swing for BJP to start losing seats in Delhi,” Verma added.
Still, Kejriwal has the ability to embarrass the BJP.
A day after his release, he said Modi, central to the ruling party’s campaign, would not be prime minister beyond 2025 when he turns 75, and would hand over the reins to Home (Interior) Minister Amit Shah.
“Modi made the rule in BJP that whoever turns 75 will be retired. So I ask BJP, who will be your prime minister?” Kejriwal said. “Modi is not seeking for votes for himself, but for Amit Shah...who will fulfil Modi’s guarantees then?“
The BJP scrambled to deny the suggestion that flag-bearer Modi would retire.

ANTI-GRAFT CRUSADER
India began voting on April 19 in the seven-phase election in which Modi, 73, is seeking to be the second prime minister to win a third straight term since independence leader Jawaharlal Nehru.
Delhi goes to the polls on May 25 and Punjab on June 1. Results are due on June 4.
Kejriwal is an anti-corruption crusader-turned-politician with a reputation of being a street-fighter. He projects himself as a messiah of the working class through AAP’s focus on health care, schools and subsidies, and has a high profile image in the media, allowing him to punch above his weight, analysts say.
The Enforcement Directorate, India’s financial crime-fighting agency, arrested him on March 21 in connection with corruption allegations related to the capital territory’s liquor policy.
Kejriwal has dismissed the graft allegations against him as an attempt by Modi’s government to destroy his party and damage the opposition. Modi and the BJP have denied the charges.
Delhi’s voters had mixed reactions to his campaign.
“Giving bail to Kejriwal is like adding fuel to the fire (for the opposition),” said Irshad, 35, a barber in Delhi’s Jahangirpuri area, who gave only his first name. “He’s a genuine leader.”
In the Model Town locality of the capital, vegetable vendor Surya Bali, 33, asked: “If he was not corrupt, why would they send him to jail?“
Some were undecided who they would vote for, including Madhuri Akshay Rajput, 30, a tailor in another part of the city. “Whether Kejriwal has done something wrong or not, going to jail dents your image,” she said. “What’s the point of voting? Nothing has changed.”

 


Fatal ICE shooting of Minneapolis activist sets stage for national protests

Updated 7 sec ago
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Fatal ICE shooting of Minneapolis activist sets stage for national protests

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Over 1,000 ‘ICE Out’ rallies planned across US

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Minnesota launches inquiry separate from federal probe

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Agent’s own video heightens contradictory accounts of shooting

MINNEAPOLIS: Civil liberties and migrant-rights groups called for nationwide rallies on Saturday to protest the fatal shooting of an activist in Minnesota by a US immigration agent, as state authorities opened their own investigation of the killing.
Protest organizers said more than 1,000 weekend events were planned across the country demanding an end to ​large-scale deployments of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents ordered by President Donald Trump, mostly to cities led by Democratic politicians.
Minneapolis became a major flashpoint of the Republican president’s militarized deportation roundups on Wednesday, when an ICE officer shot and killed a 37-year-old mother of three, Renee Good, behind the wheel of her car on a residential street.
The violence came soon after some 2,000 federal officers were dispatched to Minneapolis in what ICE’s parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, called the “largest DHS operation ever.” Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, a Democrat, condemned the deployment as a “reckless” example of “governance by reality TV.”

CONFLICTING NARRATIVES OF KILLING
On Friday night, throngs of demonstrators staged a “noise protest” outside a Minneapolis hotel believed to be lodging a visiting contingent of ICE agents.
Video posted by activists on social media showed protesters, some wearing brightly colored inflatable costumes, creating a din by beating on drums, banging pots and pans, yelling through bullhorns and blowing on brass instruments and whistles. Others directed high-power flashlight beams at the hotel’s windows. The crowd thinned after yellow-vested state police in riot gear ‌marched into the area ‌and declared an unlawful assembly, CNN reported.
Police were responding to “information that demonstrators were no longer peaceful and reports of ‌damage ⁠to property,” ​the Minnesota Department ‌of Public Safety said on X. “Dispersal orders were given prior to arrests.”
At the time she was killed, Good was participating in one of numerous “neighborhood patrols” that track, monitor and record ICE activities, according to family and local activists.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and other Trump administration officials said Good was “impeding” and “stalking” ICE agents all day, and that the officer opened fire in self-defense when she tried to ram her car into him in an “act of domestic terrorism.”
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, a Democrat, pointed to bystander video he said directly contradicted the federal government’s “garbage narrative.” Civil liberties advocates said the video showed federal agents lacked any justification for using deadly force.
Amid the sharply differing accounts of the shooting, Minnesota and Hennepin County law enforcement authorities said on Friday they were opening their own criminal inquiry of the incident separate from a federal investigation led by the FBI.
Some Trump administration officials, including Vice President JD Vance, asserted state prosecutors lack jurisdiction to ⁠charge a federal officer with a crime, though legal experts say federal immunity in such cases is not automatic.
The crisis atmosphere led Walz — a prominent Trump antagonist who branded Trump and his Republican allies as “weird” during his own ‌run for vice president last year — to put the state’s National Guard on alert.
Federal-state tensions escalated further ‍on Thursday when a US Border Patrol agent in Portland, Oregon, shot and wounded ‍a man and woman in their car after an attempted vehicle stop. As in the Minneapolis incident, DHS said the driver had tried to “weaponize” his vehicle and ‍run over agents.
DHS on Friday identified the wounded driver and passenger as suspected gang associates from Venezuela who were in the US illegally. The agency said the woman had been involved in a prior shootout in Portland but provided no evidence of its allegations against the pair.

VIDEO EVIDENCE EMERGES
Portland Mayor Keith Wilson, echoing Frey, said he could not be sure the government’s account was grounded in fact without an independent investigation.
The deployment of agents to Minneapolis follows Trump’s recent denunciations of Walz and his state’s large population of Somali immigrants over allegations of fraud dating back to 2020 by ​some nonprofit groups administering childcare and other social-service programs.
Good was shot dead just a few blocks from where George Floyd was killed by a Minneapolis police officer crushing his neck into the pavement with his knee during a videotaped arrest in May 2020. Floyd’s death sparked months of ⁠nationwide racial-justice protests during Trump’s first term in office.
Bystander video of the Minneapolis incident showed masked officers approaching Good’s Honda SUV while it was stopped at a perpendicular angle to the street, partially blocking traffic.
One agent is seen ordering her out of the car and grabbing onto the driver-side front door handle as the car pulls forward and steers away from the officers, one of whom jumps back and fires three shots into the front of the vehicle as it rolls past.
Video filmed by the officer who opened fire, identified through official comment and public records as Jonathan Ross, shows Good appearing calm. She is heard telling him, “That’s fine, dude, I’m not mad at you” — moments before he opens fire as she drives forward into the street, steering the car away from him.
Noem has said he was treated at a local hospital for unspecified injuries and released.
The car’s front bumper appears in the bystander video to pass Ross before he shot at Good. It is unclear from any of the footage whether the vehicle made contact with him.
In any case, Ross is shown remaining on his feet and can be seen walking after the incident, contradicting Trump’s assertion on social media that the woman “ran over the ICE officer.”
The two DHS-related shootings this week have drawn thousands of protesters to the streets of Minneapolis, Portland and other US cities, with many more demonstrations under the banner “ICE Out For Good” planned for Saturday and Sunday.
The rallies were being organized by ‌a coalition of groups including the American Civil Liberties Union, MoveOn Civic Action, Voto Latino, and Indivisible, some of which were at the forefront of “No Kings” protests against Trump last year. (Reporting by Renee Hickman in Minneapolis and Nathan Layne in New York; Writing and additional reporting by Steve Gorman; Additional reporting by Jonathan Allen, Joseph Ax and Maria Tsvetkova in New York and Brad ‌Brooks in Colorado; Editing by William Mallard)