AAP attacks BJP for levelling allegations against Shoaib Iqbal

New Delhi: Hitting out at BJP for accusing newly-inducted party leader Shoaib Iqbal of committing crimes, senior Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Manish Sisodia on Friday said that if any of his party leaders are guilty of a crime then BJP should have taken action against them.

Sisodia’s remarks came after BJP leader Samit Patra questioned Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s decision to induct former Congress leader Shoaib Iqbal into his party.

“If AAP leaders are guilty and murder accused then it is a matter of shame, the BJP should be in shame why they are roaming freely. For six years, BJP is in power at the Centre. Why don’t they arrest them?” he told reporters in a press conference here.

“They are saying that he (Iqbal) is roaming freely for six years and today they are speaking about him only because he joined AAP. If they are not able to run the Delhi Police, then give them under our control. We will throw every guilty behind bars,” the AAP leader said.

Iqbal, who joined AAP on Thursday has a stronghold in the Matia Mahal constituency in Delhi. He contested and won the 2013 assembly elections from JD(U).

Replying to Patra’s allegations of appeasement politics, Sisodia said that everyone knows who does polarisation politics.

When being asked to comment on the controversy around ”Chhapaak” movie, the AAP leader said: “It is very disgraceful to see people getting intimidated by films based on a social issue. How can they be scared of a movie which is based on an acid attack victim?”
“What kind of a political party are they if they are easily intimidated by and fear certain films that invoke a sense of social responsibilities among people and other important issues such as education?” he added.

The movie snowballed in controversy after Deepika Padukone joined the protest at JNU after a masked mob entered the varsity campus and attacked the students and teachers with sticks and rods.

Delhi, where 70 seats are at stake will go to polls on February 8. The counting of votes will take place on February 11.

The key contest in the national capital is among the ruling AAP, BJP, and Congress.

In the 2015 Assembly polls, AAP won 67 of 70 seats while the BJP could win only three. The Congress, which was in power for 15 years in Delhi between 1998 to 2013, drew a blank in the election.