Ahead of a high voltage Delhi Assembly elections, senior Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi lambasted INDIA bloc ally and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) chief Arvind Kejriwal at a public event on Monday, January 13, comparing him to Prime Minister and senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Narendra Modi over ‘false promises’ made to Delhi citizens.
Gandhi brought up issues of corruption, pollution and inflation in the national capital accusing Kejriwal of failing in his promises to deliver a ‘clean Delhi’.
“Arvind Kejriwal had said that he would clean Delhi, remove corruption and turn the national capital into Paris. What actually happened – one cannot move around due to pollution and inflation is at its peak,” said Gandhi at the ‘Jai Bapu, Jai Bhim, Jai Samvidhan’ public meeting in Seelampur.
He also accused both PM Modi and Kejriwal of serving “a few billionaires”. Bringing up Gautam Adani’s bribery case with the US Supreme Court, Gandhi criticized the former Delhi CM for maintaining silence over the issue.
“Poor people are becoming poorer and the rich people are growing richer. Ambani and Adani do marketing for Narendra Modi. Have you ever seen Modi or Kejriwal saying anything about them? The country is not just for a few billionaires,” Gandhi said.
Replying to Rahul Gandhi’s statements, Arvind Kejriwal refused to comment stating he is fitting for the country.
“Today, Rahul Gandhi came to Delhi. He abused me a lot. But I will not comment on his statements. His fight is to save Congress, my fight is to save the country,” said Kejriwal in a post on X.
Delhi is set to vote for all 70 assembly seats on February 5 with results to be announced on February 8. The election is a battle between AAP, Congress and the BJP.
While AAP is looking for a third successive win, the BJP is banking on its ‘double-engine’ narrative and the Congress hopes to regain its lost reigns. The Congress governed Delhi from 1998 to 2013 before it was uprooted by AAP.
The elections in the national capital are three-cornered with AAP looking to secure a hattrick while Congress is trying to take back its reigns after three consecutive terms (1998-2013) while the BJP hopes to make a comeback after 27 years.
Congress and AAP, allies of the INDIA bloc, fought together in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections restricting the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) to 293 seats while gaining 234, with the Congress holding 100 of them. However, the BJP won all seven parliamentary seats from Delhi.
