AAP leaders used slum dwellers merely as vote bank, says Yadav
Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee (DPCC) president Devender Yadav on Sunday accused the AAP leadership of shedding crocodile tears for slum dwellers who were rendered homeless after recent demolition drives.
Yadav alleged that Arvind Kejriwal and the BJP were working hand in glove to drive the poor out of Delhi. He said while AAP was in power for over 11 years, it neither build a single new flat for slum dwellers, nor allotted 45,000 flats constructed under the Congress government’s Rajiv Ratan Awas Yojna for their resettlement. Instead, Yadav claimed, AAP leaders used slum dwellers merely as a vote bank.
He reminded the people that it was former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi who first took concrete steps to provide proper housing for the urban poor, setting up policies for their resettlement. In stark contrast, Yadav said Kejriwal failed to continue the Congress legacy, abandoning ongoing in-situ construction projects such as those at Kalkaji and Jailorwala Bagh, and ignoring the Street Vendors Act, 2014, which was meant to secure livelihoods for thousands.
Yadav also accused the former Kejriwal government of failing to defend the rights of slum dwellers in court. Instead of fighting for their rehabilitation, he said, the AAP government submitted affidavits stating it would not provide alternative housing if the JJ clusters were demolished.
Slamming Kejriwal’s public rallies, Yadav said, “Today Kejriwal is baking political bread over the plight of the same people he betrayed. He should look into his soul, apologise and atone for colluding with the BJP to devastate these lives.”
The DPCC chief then posed 10 pointed questions to the former Chief Minister, asking whether Kejriwal would admit approving demolition orders in May 2021, whether his then minister Satyendar Jain did not announce the termination of in-situ housing in December 2021, and why the AAP government allowed thousands of ready flats to go to waste instead of allocating them to the poor.
He further questioned why, despite three terms in office, Kejriwal never bothered to meet the families now rendered homeless, or why AAP never passed even a single Assembly resolution to protect JJ clusters. He demanded to know when Kejriwal would apologise to the uprooted families and show true remorse instead of what he described as “crocodile tears” meant only to mislead voters.
Yadav asserted that it was the Congress that stood by the poor, fought their case in the Supreme Court, and provided real housing solutions — unlike the AAP and BJP, who, he claimed, were united in their aim of pushing the poor out of the city.
Delhi