LK Advani to Meet Yashwant Sinha in Jharkhand Jail

Hazaribagh – BJP veteran LK Advani will today meet party leader Yashwant Sinha, who has been in a Jharkhand jail for 15 days. Mr Sinha will spend another 11 days in jail in Hazaribagh, the constituency which he represented in Parliament and which elected his son in the recent national election.

Sources close to Mr Sinha said no central BJP leader had bothered to pay him a visit so far. He had injured himself on June 13, when he fell after the chair on which he was sitting broke.

Mr Sinha, 76, a former union minister, was arrested on June 2 for leading a demonstration against long power cuts in Hazaribagh. The group of BJP workers he was with tied up a senior electricity board official. The cops intervened to rescue the official and then detained Mr Sinha and 50 others.

Sources say Mr Advani is likely to try and persuade Mr Sinha to post bail for his release. He has refused twice to furnish bail unless, he says, the electricity situation improves. The charges against him include assaulting a government servant and obstructing his work.

The case will next be heard on June 28.

In court, Mr Sinha has admitted that it was on his orders that the official was tied up. The BJP leader’s insistence on not paying bail has led to many suggesting that he is pulling an “Arvind Kejriwal.” Sources say his move reflects a bid to focus on Jharkhand ahead of assembly polls due later this year. Mr Sinha bowed out of the national election this time, letting his son Jayant contest from his constituency instead.

Last month, Mr Kejriwal, the leader of the Aam Aadmi Party, was arrested in a defamation case filed against him by BJP leader Nitin Gadkari. Mr Kejriwal, often described as an innovative and habitual disruptor, spent six days in jail after refusing to pay bail.