Davanagere (Karnataka): Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal defended his former Deputy Manish Sisodia, who was arrested in connection with a liquor scam and slammed the BJP government in Karnataka for failing to arrest one of its ruling party MLAs in in a purported graft case.

"A son of an MLA of Amit Shah's party was caught with Rs 8 crore. The MLA is yet to be arrested. The BJP may bestow him with Padma Bhushan next year. The BJP MLA's son was held, but they arrested Manish Sisodia. They say Manish Sisodia is corrupted but in raids, he was found in possession of only Rs 10,000. They could not find anything even in Sisodia's bank locker," Kejriwal said addressing a rally in poll-bound Karnataka.

Kejriwal made these remarks referring to the recovery of an unaccounted cash of Rs 8 crore from BJP MLA Madal Virupaksha's son Prashant Madal's house and office.

The raids were conducted by Karnataka Lokayukta which named Virupaksha as the main accused in the graft case. The state police claim they are on the lookout for him even as Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai assured an impartial enquiry into the matter.

Referring to the 40 percent commission row, Kejriwal said the commission doubled after the BJP's double-engine government came to power in Karnataka.

"When the PM visited Karnataka in 2018 there was a 20 percent commission. PM Modi had said they will end corruption. After people formed the double-engine government, the corruption doubled and now the commission is 40 percent. Don't give them a chance anymore or else the commission will increase to 80 percent," the Delhi CM said.

Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann also accompanied Kejriwal in the rally.