Infighting in the Congress party over praising Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party founder Arvind Kejriwal continues unabated. Former Mumbai Congress president and former union minister Milind Deora faced flak from his own party colleagues for praising Arvind Kejriwal after he said that Delhi Chief Minister made the national capital a surplus state.
Deora tweeted ''@ArvindKejriwal-led Delhi Government doubled its revenues to Rs 60,000 crore & maintained a revenue surplus over the last 5 years. Food for thought: Delhi is now one of India’s most fiscally prudent governments.''
Delhi Congress party's former chief Ajay Maken was the first to react sharply against Deora asking him to “leave the party and then propagate half-baked facts”.
Thereafter, party leader Alka Lamba attacked Deora. “Join Congress in the name of father, get ticket because of political lineage and then lose the election while leading the party. But when it’s time to fight for the party, play guitar,'' she noted.
Further, Lamba quoted figures from Karnataka when Congress was in power as the government doubled its budget revenues from Rs 1,15,000 crore in 2013 to Rs 2,21,000 crore in 2018.
Another party leader Radhika Khera, who contested from Janakpuri but lost, also criticized Deora.
“As a young first time contestant, I find this extremely disappointing from our senior leaders, who instead of encouraging our own party to do better are busy patting AAP’s back! Food for thought: Delhi has run a surplus since 1994, this peaked in 2011 under Sheila Ji,” she wrote on Twitter.
Meanwhile, Deora has hit back at Maken. “Brother, I would never undermine Sheila Dikshit’s stellar performance as Delhi CM. That’s your specialty. But it’s never too late to change! Instead of advocating an alliance with AAP, if only you had highlighted Sheila ji’s achievements, @INCIndia would’ve been in power today,” he said.
It must be mentioned that party leader Sharmishtha Mukherji was the first to raise the banner as she criticized former finance minister P Chidambaram for praising AAP.
The verbal duel among the Congress leaders is taking place despite the party has reprimanded them not to speak in public and discuss the matter in the party forum only.
