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How Arvind Kejriwal used PM Modi's 'degree row' to his advantage

Written By Nirmalya Dutta | Updated: May 05, 2016, 10:40 PM IST

Arvind Kejriwal and Narendra Modi.

The Delhi CM used a complaint about his wrong address to target Narendra Modi.

Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal has fired another salvo in his long and bitter battle against the Centre as he put the spotlight on Narendra Modi's college degrees and claimed that the PM's degree from Delhi University is fake.

The entire degree row issue can be traced back to when Neeraj Saxena, on behalf of NGO Maulik Bharat Trust, moved the Delhi High Court alleging Arvind Kejriwal had violated provisions by submitting an affidavit with wrong details. 

Saxena claimed that Kejriwal had reportedly given the wrong address in a form about his residence. Following this, Kejriwal submitted a document stating change of address. He then went on to state that if he was willing to put up all his details in the public domain, why didn’t the same rule apply to PM Modi?

While contesting the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, Modi had claimed that he held a Bachelors of Arts degree from DU (1978), and a Master’s degree from Gujarat University (1983). On Sunday, Gujarat University had said Modi had been external student of the university and had an MA degree with 62.3% marks.

In a letter to the CIC, Kejriwal wrote: “I have no objections to my record being made public. But I have learnt that you have blocked information on Narendra Modi's degree. The entire country wants to know the truth. Despite that you refused to release details of his degree. Why did you do this? It is wrong.”

This led the Central Information Commission (CIC) to order the PMO to submit details of his degrees and the universities to search for them. Chief Information Commissioner Prof. M. Sridhar Acharyulu wrote: “Not prescribing the educational (degree based) qualification for contesting electoral offices is one of the great features of Indian Democracy. What needed is education not degrees. However, when a citizen holding the position of Chief Ministership wants to know the degree related information of the Prime Minister, it will be proper to disclose.

Hence, the Commission requires the PMO to provide specific number and year of the degree and PG degree to the Delhi University and the Gujrat University offices so that it will be easy for them to search and provide any documents relating to it.

The Commission directs the PIOs of Delhi University and Gujarat University, Ahmadabad to make best possible search for the information regarding degrees in the name of “Mr. Narendra   Damodar   Modi” in   the   year   1978 (Graduation in   DU) and 1983   (Post Graduation in GU) and provide it to the appellant Mr Kejriwal, as soon as possible. (The time limit is not prescribed keeping in view the difficulty in searching without specific number).”

This reply emboldened the Delhi CM to write a stinging letter to the Delhi University VC. In the letter, he wrote in Hindi, "For the last few days there is a huge controversy over PM Modi's degree. There are questions whether he indeed passed BA degree from DU. Some reports suggest he hasn't done it. According to sources, neither admission form nor marksheet, nor a certificate or any other record is present with DU. This is a serious matter because Gujarat University is saying that he has done MA from there. So if he hasn't done BA, how did he do MA?"

Kejriwal’s letter when on to make several allegations that suggested that PM Modi’s degree might not be safe and it could be lost in an ‘accident’.

Delhi University challo

On Wednesday, a week after CIC's direction to the universities, three AAP leaders—Ashutosh, Raghav Chadha and Ashish Khetan—even went to DU to seek proof of PM Modi’s graduation degree with an authorisation letter from Kejriwal. The leaders claimed that the administration refused to share details and asked them to approach the PMO instead. 

Kejriwal again took to Twitter to allege that the PM’s degree was ‘forged’. He wrote: “DU refuses to show records of PM's degree. Why? My info- he did not do BA from DU. No records in DU. Degree published by some papers forged. No records in DU related to his enrolment, his degree, his marksheets and convocation.Why is DU refusing info abt PM's degree? Becoz he does not have it."

After the meeting, Khetan told reporters, "We met the Registrar and sought information about PM's degree but the administration refused to share any details. Investigations have revealed that his degree is fake, he never enrolled here, gave any exam or got any graduation degree from here and if there wasn't a BA degree, there is no possibility of him having a valid MA degree".

"Since past two years, DU has not been able to find information about his degree or admission and despite the CIC order they asked us to approach PMO if we wanted to see his degree," he added.

DU Vice Chancellor told PTI, "The university's department dealing with RTIs is looking into the issue and will reply accordingly."

Legally, if the claims turn out to be false, giving false evidence can be charged under Section 191 of the Indian Penal Code.

The Section 191 of the Indian Penal Code reads:

Giving false evidence —Whoever, being legally bound by an oath or by an express provision of law to state the truth, or being bound by law to make a declaration upon any subject, makes any statement which is false, and which he either knows or believes to be false or does not believe to be true, is said to give false evidence.

Rows about degrees of politicians are certainly not uncommon in politics. The list includes the AAP’s Bhavna Gaur, Jitender Tomar and Surender Singh, CPI(M)’s Keshab Debbarma and BJP’s Vinod Tawde, Sangeet Som and Smriti Irani.

In the early 2000s, current Rajya Sabha MP Subramanian Swamy alleged that Sonia Gandhi had filed a false affidavit about her degree in the 2004 Lok Sabha polls.

Usually, the murky degrees’ debate doesn’t lead anywhere concrete in Indian politics and we will have to wait and watch to see if PM Modi actually feels the repercussions, but history suggests that murky educational qualifications really don’t affect a political career, even though Tomar had to resign as Delhi Law Minister.

All in all, one has to admire Kejriwal’s canny ability to remain in the news as he somehow manages to get every mainstream media organisation to focus their stories on him, and for that ability to manipulate the media, we must applaud him, for we’re hard-pressed to think of any politician who has managed to garner news attention, putting even the pre-2014 media savvy Narendra Modi in the shade.