New Delhi: Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP Bansuri Swaraj on Saturday launched a blistering attack on the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and its Chief Arvind Kejriwal, criticising the AAP supremo of adopting “double standards” by leading luxurious lifestyle while promising the opposite to the people.
She also alleged that “ideological bankruptcy” is now visible in the AAP since few of its founding members have now quit the party.
Addressing the press after seven AAP Rajya Sabha MPs merged with the BJP, Swaraj said that while the AAP initially presented itself as a political alternative, but later “proved to be an old wine in a new bottle”.
“They emerged from the Anna Hazare movement, but later, they betrayed Anna Hazare as well,” she said.
About the seven MPs quitting the AAP, Swaraj noted: “They have rejected the party’s ‘anti-women’ politics, double standards, deception and lies,” she added.
She mentioned that the AAP’s “drama of bearing a common man persona” did not work in Delhi which is why the people ousted them from power.
Accusing Kejriwal of wearing a “mask”, Swaraj asked him to present his reality to the public.
Taking a jibe at Kejriwal’s infamous muffler, the BJP leader said, “He gets cough just before the elections.”
“He (Kejriwal) dresses like a common man but that attire is a tool to deceive the people,” Swaraj added.
Reiterating the “Sheesh Mahal” allegations at the AAP supremo, the BJP leader said, “During Covid-19, when people needed their Chief Minister (Arvind Kejriwal) the most, he was busy using their money to build his ‘Sheesh Mahal’.”
BJP MP Swaraj alleged that after losing the Assembly polls in Delhi, Kejriwal went to Punjab and “misused government funds for leading a luxurious lifestyle”.
“Any helicopter, plane, or similar facility provided by the government is meant for official purposes, especially for the Chief Minister of a state. But Arvind Kejriwal used such government resources for travel, at the expense of Punjab taxpayers, sometimes justifying it as election campaigning,” she said.
She also added, “Despite not being an MLA or a Chief Minister, he (Kejriwal) stayed at the official government residence of one of his former Rajya Sabha MPs.”
Swaraj asserted that Kejriwal had promised the people of Delhi to never use the official car or stay in the official residence provided by the government.
But he did both these things, she said.
She alleged that Kejriwal built the “Sheesh Mahal” by misusing the government’s and taxpayers’ money.
Swaraj said, “The issue is not about leading a luxurious lifestyle, it about the double standards.”
She emphasised that the AAP leadership should “self introspect” at the mass resignations of their leaders.
(IANS)
