Since 2014, as many as 25 prominent politicians facing action from Central agencies for alleged corruption have crossed over to the BJP. They cut across party lines: 10 are from the Congress; four each from NCP and Shiv Sena; three from TMC; two from TDP; and one each from SP and YSRCP.
Three of the cases have been closed; 20 others remain stalled or in cold storage — the investigative agency’s action, after the switch, has been, in fact, inaction. Six of the politicians on this list moved to the BJP this year alone, weeks before the general elections.This is in sharp contrast to what happens when the accused is in the Opposition — an investigation by The Indian Express in 2022 revealed how 95 per cent of prominent politicians that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) took action against after 2014, when the NDA came to power, were from the Opposition. In 2009, in the Congress-led UPA years, an investigation by The Indian Express revealed file notings to show the CBI had changed course in the corruption cases against BSP’s Mayawati and SP’s Mulayam Singh Yadav when the two leaders were being courted by the ruling UPA.
In 2022, the Eknath Shinde faction broke away from the Shiv Sena and formed a new government with the BJP. A year later, the Ajit Pawar faction broke away from the NCP and joined the ruling NDA coalition.
Records show that cases faced by two top leaders of the NCP faction, Ajit Pawar and Praful Patel, were subsequently closed. In all, 12 prominent politicians from Maharashtra are on the list of 25, eleven of whom switched to the BJP in 2022 or later, including four each from NCP, Shiv Sena and Congress.
Some of these cases present a stark picture:
