As the high-stakes Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) polls inch closer, political parties are pulling out all the stops including trading bitter barbs and coining quirky phrases.
While the BJP leaders have used ‘Dhokha Ratna’ and ‘Kattar Beiman’ to target AAP leaders, the latter used ‘video-making company’ and ‘mountain of failures’ to attack its biggest rival ahead of the crucial vote on December 4.
The BJP has been in power in the MCD since 2007. During its 15-year-run at its helm, the party has seen the civic body trifurcated into NDMC, SDMC, and EDMC (2012-2022), and its reunification earlier this year.
The fever pitch was raised in the past few weeks after several chief ministers and Union ministers have stumped for BJP candidates while engaging in political attacks often targeting the AAP and its supremo Arvind Kejriwal.
‘Dhokha Ratna’
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan on Monday cornered his Delhi counterpart on the issue of corruption, saying Kejriwal should get a “Dhokha Ratna” for creating a “mess” and bringing ignominy to the national capital.
Campaigning for the BJP candidates, he said, “We have heard about the Great Wall of China… Kejriwal has now become the ‘corruption wall’.” Chouhan also attacked the AAP convenor for defending his ministers Manish Sisodia and Satyendar Jain.
“It is amusing that Kejriwal demanded Bharat Ratna for Satyendar Jain and Manish Sisodia. Kejriwal should be given ‘Dhokha Ratna Puraskar’ and Sisodia ‘Sharab Ratna Pursakar’ for the existing condition of Delhi,” he said.
Citing leaked videos of Satyendar Jain from Tihar jail that showed him taking a massage in his cell, the senior BJP leader said, “He (Jain) should get the ‘Ghotala and Massage Ratna’.”
However, the AAP chief has made light of the videos, allegedly released by the BJP, and labelled the saffron party as a “video-making company” whose business as a party has been shut by the people of Delhi.
In a press conference on Tuesday, Kejriwal said the release of sting videos on AAP leaders by the BJP before civic polls are “awful and boring films” which no one wants to watch.
Kejriwal’s remarks have come in the backdrop of a row over videos of jailed AAP minister Satyendar Jain purportedly showing him getting massages and other facilities in the Tihar prison, where he is lodged since May 31 in a money laundering case registered by the Enforcement Directorate.
After the purported videos had surfaced, BJP national spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia had on November 22, demanded Kejriwal to apologise to the entire nation and dismiss Satyendar Jain. Playing on the acronym AAP, he called it “arajak aparadhi party,” and accused it of “defending” Jain’s folly in jail.
Over allegations linked with the excise policy case, Bhatia had in August said that Kejriwal’s silence on corruption charges proved he was a “kattar beiman” (hardcore dishonest)” and not a “kattar imandar” (hardcore honest)” as he professed to be.
The bickering between the two parties has intensified over the past few months.
On November 25, Union minister Anurag Thakur said that the AAP government in Delhi had become synonymous with anarchy, and alcohol, scams, and corruption were its three friends. Campaigning for the BJP, Thakur had said the AAP chief penned an unforgettable chapter on “the politics of lies” in his seven years in power.
‘mountain of failure’
AAP hasn’t pulled its punches either and often sought to bury its opponent under the weight of the landfill sites issue.
During an interaction with the people in the Badli assembly segment on November 27, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia claimed that the Bhalswa landfill site symbolises the BJP’s “mountain of failure” during its 15-year-rule in the city’s civic body.
The AAP’s poll campaign song is called ‘MCD mey bhi Kejriwal’ and they have also launched ‘Kejriwal ki Sarkar, Kejriwal ka Paarshad’, which AAP says is a drive to “alert voters to pick only AAP councillors and not a single BJP councillor” in the election.
(With inputs from PTI)
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