BJP, Cong slam Kejriwal as
protests intensify, SC agrees to hear PIL against him
On the second day of his
protest, Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday upped the ante,
threatening to flood Rajpath, the venue of Republic Day celebrations, with
lakhs of supporters demanding action against policemen who refused to carry out
a raid on an alleged drug and prostitution ring.
He ruled out any negotiations to scale down
the protest, saying the safety of women in the capital is not a matter of
negotiation.
"We will continue our
protest. How can home minister (Sushilkumar) Shinde sleep when so many crimes
are happening in Delhi? When women are unsafe in the city? We won't
negotiate," Kejriwal told reporters.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed
to hear two PILs seeking
action against Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and law minister Somnath
Bharti for creating chaos in the heart of the capital by going on in an
unprecedented 10-day sit-in protest.
The apex court bench headed by
Chief Justice P Sathasivam said they will hear the PILs on Friday. The
petitioners, advocate ML Sharma and another advocate, said the chief minister
was supposed to maintain law and order but was instead creating a law and order
problem by his ongoing agitation seeking suspension from service of five
policemen.
Meanwhile, reacting to Kejriwal
led protest, Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) Prakash Javadekar on Tuesday said
that that the protest was a planned conspiracy of the Congress and the AAP.
I will blame Congress for all the
drama that is going on. It is a joint conspiracy of the Congress and AAP, and
is the formers attempt to divert attention from corruption allegations on their
leaders, said Javadekar.
The Congress is ready to bring
any kind of situation in the country to reduce the popularity of BJP prime
ministerial candidate Narendra Modi, he said.
It is a desperate attempt by the
Congress to stop the BJP from winning the elections. Eventually, they will apply their
exit plan which also must be ready. Through that they will make the AAP heroes
again, because they cannot fight the BJP alone, he added.
He further said that Kejriwal had
demeaned patriotism through his statement on Republic day.
The kind of remark that he has
made about Republic Day is condemnable. He has insulted it by calling it just a
day of procession of floats. He must apologise to the nation, said Javadekar.
Congress General Secretary
Digvijay Singh has also attacked Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal for
taking the "agitation route" and said he should maintain the dignity
of the office he holds by adopting constitutional means to resolve his
stand-off with the Centre.
In a tweet last night, Digvijay
said that when ex-CM Sheila Dikshit used to say that Delhi Police wasn't under
her control, AAP used to make fun of her.
"AAP should take a
delegation to the Prime Minister and speak to him, should try and pass a bill
in Parliament," the Congress leader tweeted. Also, it should be noted that
whenever on duty, Kejriwal has never followed the rules and regulations and has
always broken the law (and protocol), he said.
"Be it today or be it his
tenure in the Income Tax Department," Digvijay added. Yesterday too, the
former Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister had said that it was the Delhi Police's
duty to maintain law and order in the national capital.
"Will the police garland him
if the honourable chief minister of Delhi wants to sit on a dharna without
permission, which can disrupt peace?" he asked.
Both Kejriwal and the AAP should
not interfere in the working of the Delhi Police which should be allowed to do
its duty, Singh, whose party is extending outside support to the 25-day-old
Government formed by the fledgling outfit in Delhi, had said.
Unlike Monday, hundreds of AAP supporters thronged the venue of the dharna
outside Rail Bhavan in the high security area close to the venue of Republic
Day preparations.
The chief minister along with his
six cabinet colleagues and scores of supporters spent the night outside the
Rail Bhavan, the venue of their protest, braving the cold winter.
Kejriwal slept on the road under
the open sky while some of his supporters spent the night singing and raising
slogans around a bonfire.
A number of cabinet ministers
also slept on the road. Kejriwal threatened that "If the demands are not
met then lakhs of our supporters will come to Rajpath. They (the Centre) must
listen to the people." Attacking the home minister, he said he will
not shift to Jantar Mantar as requested by the police and the Centre will have
to accept his demand for action against the policemen who had refused to act
against the alleged drug and prostitution racket.
"Have the people of Delhi
given them the right to make decisions for them? No. They have given me the
right. How can Shinde ask me where to sit? I will tell him where to sit,"
he said.
The chief minister also accused
the police of harassing his supporters at the protest venue and said the area
has been turned into a jail.
They have turned this small area into a jail.
There are not toilets here. I was using a toilet at Rail Bhavan here yesterday
(Monday). Today they have even closed that. We had arranged a public toilet
somehow yesterday which they did not allow to bring here. They are even not
allowing food to be brought here.
"I had to go to the
barricade myself to bring the tea inside. The people protesting here are not
Pakistanis or Americans. They are our own people. Where will the women go for
using a toilet? Has Shinde announced a war against the people?," he said.
Criticising Shinde,
Kejriwal said the home minister had "suspended" a number of policemen
after some people barged into his residence few months back but no action is
taken if women are harassed.
"He (Shinde) is
saying that we will celebrate Republic Day but for whom? The VIPS will watch
the parades. That is not Republic Day celebration.
"Someone was
telling me that a window was broken by protestors at Shinde's residence few
months ago. 12 policemen were suspended. When a woman is raped, he says we will
get an inquiry done but won't suspend the police," he charged.
"A woman was burnt
but police is not arresting anyone as they will first get an inquiry done. RK
Singh was right in saying that it is money which reaches the top," he
said.
Asking Shinde to support
the common man's cause, the chief minister claimed that there will be
"rebellion" in Delhi Police as lower level police officials were with
AAP.
"A man resigned and
came to join us. He had tears in his eyes. Another man who was shouting slogans
in our favour was suspended. There will be a rebellion in Delhi Police
too," he said.
Coming down hard on the
home minister, Kejriwal also accused him of trying to "run" Delhi and
justified his protest, saying political discourse in the country has undergone
a change.
"We were elected by
the people. They approach us. We asked Shinde in a meeting if people approach
him when women are raped or burnt. He said 'no'. But people come to us and ask
what are you doing. Who is Shinde to run Delhi? He is beginning to think he is
the chief minister of Delhi," he alleged.
"Politics will now
be run by these unconventional methods. The political discourse of India has
changed forever now. This is democracy," he said.
Kejriwal blamed Shinde
for the inconvenience caused to people due to closing down of a number of Metro
stations around Central Delhi.
"Shinde has closed
the metro stations. I had told Metro officials to run the Metro. They said they
cannot do it as Delhi Police has closed them. Shinde is causing inconvenience
not only to us but also to the general public. He has closed the Metro
stations," he said.
Kejriwal, his six
ministers and about 200 workers of his Aam Aadmi Party spent the night at the
venue of their indefinite protest that they began shortly before noon on
Monday.
The AAP protest is
turning out to be a security nightmare for the Delhi Police, which has been
tasked with securing the area ahead of this year's Republic Day parade.
Kejriwal, who spent the
night at the demonstration site, urged the public to join him in demanding
police reforms, starting with the removal of three police officers who had
refused to carry out a series of arrests on the orders of Delhi law minister,
Somnath Bharti.
Home minister Shinde has
said there is no question of any action being taken against the police
personnel till a judicial enquiry is completed. Kejriwal has said this is
unacceptable.
Earlier on Monday,
Kejriwal declared himself an “anarchist” and called for a 10-day protest,
creating traffic chaos and a standoff with hundreds of Delhi Police officers.
He took to the streets
near the site of the annual Republic Day military parade to press his demands
for reforms of the police in the capital.
The unprecedented
government-led protests in the country's most sensitive security areas, minutes
away from Parliament and the Prime Minister's Office, also saw pre-emptive
closure of four metro stations.
Early on Monday,
baton-wielding police prevented Kejriwal and AAP leaders from taking their stir
against alleged police inaction to the doorstep of the Union home ministry,
which controls Delhi Police.
"We have come here
for auto drivers, the hawkers and everyone who have to pay bribes to the Delhi
police," he said after battling blockades to reach a spot near the
presidency building.
After his address, he
sat on a makeshift podium surrounded by several hundred AAP supporters as more
than 1,000 police and several anti-riot vehicles stood by.
“Some people say that
I'm an anarchist creating disorder. Yes I'm an anarchist. I agree to
that!" Kejriwal shouted. “But today every home has this anarchy, it's so
expensive that people can't make ends meet. Women are unsafe.
By evening the situation
turned more chaotic after AAP leaders and supporters jostled with the police,
accusing them of having assaulted a party MLA. The police denied the charge.
Traffic snarls
intensified in several parts of an already gridlocked Capital as the stand-off
continued.
The chief minister wants
the Delhi Police force to come under the control of the state government
instead of the central government, which runs it via the home ministry.
Delhi law minister Somnath Bharti had last week set out to “uncover a sex and drug
racket” at a building in south Delhi’s Khirki Extension, having earlier sent a
decoy customer. But when Bharti, a lawyer, asked the policemen accompanying him
to raid the building, they refused in the absence of a search warrant or proper
police back-up. “The ‘raid’ would have been illegal,” said a senior officer.
Rakhi Birla, the women
and child development minister, had her own run-in with the police in Sagarpur
when they allegedly refused to apprehend the in-laws of a woman who has been
hospitalised with 45% burns.
