New Delhi: Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Friday hit out at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for calling the AAP chief an “outsider” and alleged that the saffron party was against migrants living in the national capital.
The AAP’s criticism came a day after Union minister Harsh Vardhan questioned Kejriwal for calling himself “Delhi’s son” in a tweet. “How did a person who was born in Hisar in Haryana and who joined the Anna Hazare movement from Ghaziabad become a son of Delhi? This election is between lie and truth, and nationalism and traitors…,” Vardhan had tweeted Thursday.
Responding to this Kejriwal said, “Doctor Sahib, you hate me. You can abuse me. But, how can you call all those born in UP and Haryana and settled in Delhi outsiders? They may be outsiders to the BJP. But they are part of our Delhi family. We Delhiites adopted them all, made them our family.”
Later in the day, AAP leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh, in a press conference, said going by Vardhan’s comment, the BJP should sack its Delhi unit chief Manoj Tiwari as he, too, is an “outsider”. The AAP leader accused the BJP of being anti-Poorvanchalis and anti-migrants.
“I want to ask the BJP and Vardhan. Haven’t Manoj Tiwari and his supporters come from UP-Bihar and taken up residence in Delhi? If you do not consider them to be from Delhi, will you dare to throw them out of the party and the national Capital? Don’t insult the people of UP, Bihar and Haryana like this. Arvind Kejriwal is Delhi’s son and he has fulfilled all his duties as a son would. People of Delhi are not going to be misled by such humiliating statements from you,” Singh said.
{{/usCountry}}“I want to ask the BJP and Vardhan. Haven’t Manoj Tiwari and his supporters come from UP-Bihar and taken up residence in Delhi? If you do not consider them to be from Delhi, will you dare to throw them out of the party and the national Capital? Don’t insult the people of UP, Bihar and Haryana like this. Arvind Kejriwal is Delhi’s son and he has fulfilled all his duties as a son would. People of Delhi are not going to be misled by such humiliating statements from you,” Singh said.
{{/usCountry}}He said this is not the first time that the BJP is using such a strategy. “In Maharashtra, people from UP, Bihar (Poorvanchalis) were beaten up and forced to flee. Migrants from these states suffered a similar fate or much worse while working in Surat and Ahmedabad, in Gujarat. Not even one leader of the BJP spoke in favour of those people who were victimised,” Singh said.