New Delhi, Dec 8 : Hundreds of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leaders and workers rallied at the busy ITO here on Tuesday in the wake of reports that Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal was detained at his residence, a charge denied by the police.
As AAP activists, including a number of party MLAs, held a dharna at one of Delhi’s busiest intersections to voice their demand to march to Kejriwal’s residence to meet him, vehicular movement was severely hampered in the area. Police had to divert traffic on alternate routes.
The Aam Aadmi Party supporters claimed that their leaders were prevented from joining the ongoing nationwide shutdown called by protesting farmers.
A large number of policemen was deployed on the spot to control the situation. Police even stopped the AAP activists by putting up barricades, as protesters rallied on both sides of the busy road near the AAP headquarters.
Delhi Health Minister Satyendar Jain claimed that the detention of Kejriwal showed that the NDA government at the Centre wished to muzzle every voice raised in support of the protesting farmers.
“Arvind Kejriwal met farmers at the Singhu border yesterday. He had said that we’ll serve them like ‘sevadars’ and support them. After he returned, Delhi Police barricaded his residence from all sides, putting him under house arrest. No one is allowed to go outside or inside the CM house,” he tweeted.
AAP’s Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh also alleged that as soon as the Chief Minister returned to his official residence from Singhu on the Delhi-Haryana border on Monday, “he was detained on the orders of the Union Home Minister”.
“Kejriwal was arrested so that he could not leave his house to support the nationwide shutdown,” the AAP leader claimed.
On the other hand, Delhi Police had said that the Chief Minister was neither arrested nor detained.
AAP leader Gajendra Bhati, who was among the protesters at the ITO, said: “Why are we being prevented from going to the Chief Minister’s residence? If he is not under detention, why are we not allowed to meet him?”
Disclaimer: This story is auto-generated from IANS service.