NEW DELHI: Delhi chief minister Atishi on Sunday levelled charges at Bharatiya Janata Party accusing it of sending goons and hardened criminals to attack AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal during his election campaign in the New Delhi constituency.
At a press conference, Atishi said that the alleged attacker was connected to BJP’s New Delhi candidate Parvesh Verma and was involved in the former MP’s election campaign. She also showed photographs of the alleged attacker with Parvesh Verma.
“Arvind Kejriwal ji’s car was attacked in New Delhi constituency. BJP goons carried out the attack. Such a large stone was thrown at his car that if it had hit someone, it could have been fatal. Who were these people who carried out this attack? If you look at the video of the assault, you will see a person named Shanky,” Atishi said.
“He is associated with the BJP and often puts up posters of Parvesh Verma in his area. Who is this Rahul alias Shanky? He has a hardcore criminal background. There are cases of attempted robbery against him… It is very clear that hardened criminals and goons were sent to attack Arvind Kejriwal,” she added.
Former CM Kejriwal also accused BJP of carrying out a murder attempt on him and said that this is how the saffron party knows to contest elections.
“The kind of campaign we are seeing this time is unseen. The people of Delhi have never seen such violence. A murder attempt was carried out on a former CM. My life is dedicated to the society and the nation. They are losing badly and this is how they know to contest an election,” Kejriwal said.
AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh claimed that BJP wanted to win elections through “murderers and dacoits.” Singh also urged the agencies to take action.
“The most important thing is what these murderers and dacoits are doing in the New Delhi constituency. Are they here to murder Arvind Kejriwal? They have cases against them. Do they want to win election through them? Repeated attacks are happening against Arvind Kejriwal,” Singh said.
“Yesterday, there was an attempt to murder. I want to ask the agencies to take action. And it is apparent that they have the support, otherwise they would have been arrested by now,” he added.
In response, the BJP candidate from the New Delhi assembly seat, Parvesh Verma, accused Kejriwal and his team of violence and misconduct.
“You cannot become ‘Aam Aadmi’ by naming your party ‘Aam Aadmi’. When youth come to talk to you about employment then you hit them by your car…Yesterday, three voters of this Assembly tried to approach Arvind Kejriwal to talk to him.”
“They didn’t have any weapons. They (AAP) yesterday posted a photo and said that the person is related to BJP and me. Arvind Kejriwal calls local voters, goons. First, he said that these three people have come from West Delhi, Haryana, Mundka village. When he got to know that they were local voters, he changed his statement and said that his car was attacked with a stone. I will show you the unedited video.”
This comes a day after the Aam Aadmi Party alleged that the former Delhi chief minister’s car was attacked during the election campaigning. AAP shared a video on their official X handle which purportedly shows a stone being thrown at the Arvind Kejriwal’s car.
Delhi will go to the polls on February 5, and the votes will be counted on February 8. The New Delhi Assembly seat will see a triangular contest between Kejriwal, BJP’s Parvesh Verma, and Congress’ Sandeep Dikshit.