AAP blames BJP for chilli attack, claims conspiracy to kill Arvind Kejriwal

Sonipat/New Delhi :  A day after Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal was attacked with chilli powder at the Delhi Secretariat, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Wednesday pointed fingers at the BJP alleging there was a “conspiracy” to eliminate the AAP chief.

Without taking names, Kejriwal said the repeated attacks on him were “planned” and “they want to kill” him.

“It is obvious that the attacks are planned. We are an obstacle in their path. They want to kill me. They are attacking us repeatedly. I feel, in the history of India, there is not even one case where a Chief Minister was attacked four times in two years,” he told the media in Sonipat in Haryana.

He added that the attacks were a result of his party doing a “good job” in Delhi.

“They feel if the AAP continues to be in power, people will start questioning them and their credentials,” said Kejriwal in an apparent reference to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

Earlier, addressing the media in the national capital, his Deputy Manish Sisodia alleged that the top BJP leadership “planned” the whole attack to “kill” Kejriwal.

Sisodia said since the BJP failed to stop the AAP government from working for the people of Delhi, “it is now trying to kill Kejriwal”.

He also said that Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh, who also heads Delhi Police, called up Kejriwal asking him to file a complaint.

“The Chief Minister of Delhi was attacked in the presence of police and he advises us to file a complaint? This insensitive attitude suggests that even Rajnath Singh knew of the plan to attack Kejriwal,” Sisodia said.

He also targeted Delhi Lt. Governor Anil Baijal, the in-charge of law and order in Delhi, for not even “bothering about the attack”. “He did not even tweet about the attack.”

On Tuesday afternoon, Kejriwal was attacked by 40-year-old Anil Kumar Sharma with chilli powder when he stepped out of his office after a meeting at the Delhi Secretariat. Sharma was detained by the Delhi Police immediately after the attack.

Sisodia claimed that Sharma was a BJP worker and had a history of hurling abuses on Kejriwal through his Facebook posts.

“It is written on his Facebook page that he is a member of the BJP Business and according to his identity card he lives near BJP leader Karan Singh Tanwar’s house. He hurls abuses on Kejriwal on Facebook and says BJP ‘zindabad’ in the same post,” he said.

“All this proves that Sharma is directly connected to the BJP,” said Sisodia, also accusing the Delhi Police of working at the behest of the BJP.

Sisodia said the Delhi Police was giving a clear message that if a person attacked Kejriwal, “he/she will be treated like a VIP and be served tea”.

Published on: Nov 21, 2018 at 19:22 IST

IANS