NEW DELHI: “Paris jaisi Dilli“, “jugalbandi between Congress and BJP“, “Friends every morning and fight at night” … the knives are out as the three-way battle for Delhi gets bigger and bitter.
The ruling AAP, which faces an aggressive BJP and a belligerent Congress in its pursuit for a third consecutive term, has accused its political rivals of being hand in glove. Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday claimed that the February 5 elections would expose the ‘jugalbandi’ going on behind the scenes between the Congress and the BJP for years.
The AAP supremo was reacting to a post by Amit Malviya, which the BJP IT department head had made in response to Kejriwal’s attack on Rahul Gandhi.
When Kejriwal responded to Rahul Gandhi’s attacks on him with a dig “I am working to save the country, he is fighting to save the Congress”, BJP leader Amit Malviya used this response to take a swipe at the AAP chief and advised him to first save his New Delhi assembly seat and worry about the country later.
Kejriwal who has represented the New Delhi seat since 2013 is pitted against BJP’s Parvesh Verma and Congress leader Sandeep Dikshit this time.
In fact, Congress candidate Sandeep Dikshit reacting sharply to Kejriwal’s remarks, questioned the AAP chief’s integrity. “Which country is he saving? When you swindled Rs 2,000 crore in the liquor policy, were you saving the country? When you claimed you wouldn’t buy a bungalow and instead moved into a luxurious Rs 30-32 crore palace, were you saving the country? When you were secretly helping the BJP win in Haryana, Goa, and Uttarakhand, were you saving the country? And when you failed to clean the drains, failed to provide water, and polluted Delhi’s air, were you saving the country then?” Dikshit questioned.
WATCH: ‘Paris jaisi Delhi dekho’: Rahul Gandhi takes jibe at Arvind Kejriwal’s 2019 promise
The verbal duel between friends-turned-rivals sharpened on Tuesday as Rahul Gandhi continued with his relentless attacks on the AAP government taunting Kejriwal’s model of governance in the national capital.
A day after comparing Kejriwal to Prime Minister Narendra Modi over fake promises, Rahul today launched a campaign to “expose” AAP government’s empty and hollow promises of transforming Delhi into a world-class city.
“Dekho, dilli dekho, yeh hai chamkati hui dilli. Paris jaisi dilli … sab jagah yahi haal hai” (See the city, this is Delhi, this is shining Delhi, the Delhi which looks like Paris), Rahul was heard saying on camera as he visited Delhi’s Rithala area to showcase the glaring gaps between the AAP government’s promises and reality on the ground.
Meanwhile, the BJP seems to be enjoying this war of words between the two INDIA bloc partners.
Madhya Pradesh cabinet minister Kailash Vijayvargiya took a potshot at the Congress vs AAP tussle and said that they (Congress) make friends in the morning and fight at night.
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“Sometimes they (Congress) shake hands and sometimes they break each other’s hands. It is their culture (sanskaar). Sometimes they join hands with West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee and sometimes Mamata ji abuses them and again they abuse Mamata ji. Similarly, sometimes they join hands with Akhilesh Yadav, then leave hands and abuse each other,” Vijayvargiya said.
“These are the kind of people, who make friends every morning and fight at night. Now whether these people abuse or praise is not important, the public knows everything,” he added.
And it’s not just the BJP that is attacking the Congress. On Tuesday, Sharad Pawar, one of the key architects of the INDIA bloc, also sided with Arvind Kejriwal in the Delhi battle joining the likes of Mamata Banerjee and Akhilesh Yadav. The two regional leaders have already announced their support for AAP in the Delhi elections making it a lonely battle for the grand-old-party. The only relief perhaps for the Congress is that none of these parties have much presence in the national capital.
This is not the first time that AAP and Congress are facing off in Delhi. In the last two assembly elections also the Congress was AAP’s rival but could not make any impact and even failed to open its account. But this time around the Congress seems to be gunning for Kejriwal like never before. With the AAP battling 10 years of anti-incumbency, will the Congress manage to dent the fortunes of the ruling party?