Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convenor Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday said that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is troubled by the fact that he is "the darling of people".
Referring to ongoing investigations against AAP leaders, Kejriwal dared the BJP to send him to prison if he is indeed corrupt.
The comment by Kejriwal comes in the run up to the election to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), which was unified into one municipal body earlier this year when Delhi's East, North, and South civic bodies were merged into one.
In a tweet in Hindi, Kejriwal also listed the previous allegations of the BJP against him.
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He said, "Before Punjab [elections], the Prime Minister said Kejriwal is a terrorist. The Home Minister initiated an investigation. What happened of it? Now they are saying before Gujarat and MCD elections that Kejriwal is corrupt. Arrey, if Kejriwal is corrupt or a terrorist, then why don't you arrest him? Kejriwal is neither a terrorist nor corrupt. He is the darling of the people. The BJP has an issue with this."
MCD elections are scheduled to be held on December 4 and the counting of votes will take place on December 7. The unified MCD has been demarcated into 250 wards. Earlier there were 272 wards.
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The BJP has governed the civic bodies in Delhi since 2007. It is pitted against a resurgent AAP and the Congress. In the 2017 civic body polls, the BJP had won 181 of the 270 wards. No polling could be held on two seats due to the death of candidates. The AAP had won 48 wards, while the Congress managed to win 27.
The unified MCD covers 96 per cent of Delhi and only two pockets —the New Delhi Municipal Council that primarily covers the Lutyens' Delhi and Delhi Cantonment Board that manages the cantonment area— will remain out of MCD's ambit.
Outlook earlier reported that the BJP is targeting the clean image of AAP as its leaders like Manish Sisodia, Satyendar Jain, and Amanatullah Khan face corruption cases.
Outlook noted, "For the last few months, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has been targeting frequent salvos at the Arvind Kejriwal government for its alleged corruption related, first in the Delhi Excise Policy and then in deals related to the Delhi Transport Corporation (DTC).
"Political observers point out that attacking AAP on the ground of corruption is an effort to change the narratives of the new politics that Kejriwal brought with him through Lokpal movement. The emergence of AAP was a result of the middle-class intolerance toward the corruption that the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government was steeped in."
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(With PTI inputs)
