NEW DELHI: Members of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) slammed the Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for the baggage that both of them added with respect to the 1984 and 2002 Gujarat riots, which were discussed at length in the Delhi Assembly on Thursday.
A verdict in one of the cases related to the 1984 anti-Sikh riots came this week convicting Delhi Congress stalwart Sajjan Kumar for leading a mob which killed two people from Sikh community in 1984 and sentencing him to life imprisonment.
AAP MLAs also patted their own back for approving the Phase 4 of Delhi Metro while attacking the BJP for creating hurdles in the project.
“The way our Mohalla Clinic and CCTV projects where BJP created hurdles so that the public can not benefitted, the same BJP did with Metro Phase 4. The officers in the Centre kept on stopping the files related to the project. Hardeep Puri kept on saying that they can do the project without the help of Delhi government then why they did not do it?” said Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot.
Adding to Gahlot’s question, Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia said “Metro is a requirement for people of Delhi, not a luxury. If deciding the fare price was in our hands, then we would have reduced the fares by 25 per cent so that it is affordable to the common public. They (BJP) are always ahead in taking credit but when it comes to paying, we have stepped forward. Why?”
Party MLA Amanatullah Khan, targeting both the BJP and the Congress said, “When the BJP is condemning the 1984 riots, then they should also speak about the 2002 riots in Godhra. If justice had been served for the victims of 2002 then incidents in Muzaffarnagar and Bulandshahar would not have taken place. That police officer Subodh Kumar saved so many lives but ultimately sacrificed his own. The CM of UP talked about cow slaughter but spoke not a word on that slain officer.”
However, the Leader of Opposition, Vijendra Gupta, said that the project was delayed because of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s “petty politics”. He added that the delay had escalated the cost of the project by 100 crore. “Why the sudden change of heart by the Kejriwal government today? They have approved the project after three years. It is the same officers and government in the Centre. What has changed? This is just a simple case where you want to blame officers for your politics,” quipped Gupta.