Footage of Delhi Chief Minister and AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal went viral on social media on Thursday, where he was confronted by a BJP leader over his government’s repeated claims of developing schools in his constituency. Kejriwal left the meeting in a tearing hurry, prompting Twitter users to mock the Delhi CM, saying that he had 'run away'.
The video showed New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) member Kuljeet Singh Chahal confronting the CM over his AAP government’s claims about school development.
Citing a Right to Information (RTI) query in which multiple questions about the AAP's school development policy were asked, Chahal pointed out that one of them was about if Kejriwal utilised funds from his MLA quota for development in NDMC schools.
According to the reply given to the RTI query, there was no money given by Kejriwal during the period from 2015-16 to 2021-22.
Predicatably, the CM walking out of the meeting was poorly received by the BJP, which lambasted the Delhi CM.
BJP IT cell chief Amit Malviya took to his Twitter and said that Kejriwal fled from the meeting because the AAP leader could not answer the questions raised during the meeting.
Meanwhile, the saffron party's national vice president Baijayant Jay Panda called Kejriwal's move a "desperate measure to hide its failed education policy" and said that this will only bring out further truth about AAP’s "double standards," adding, "Conveniently, Delhi CM walks out when faced with hard-hitting questions by NDMC member Kuljeet Chahal."
On August 29 this year, the BJP had alleged a scam in the Delhi Education Department, saying the city government increased the budget for the construction of classrooms in its existing schools, ignoring the Central Public Works Department’s guidelines.
Citing a Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) report sent to the Delhi government's Vigilance Department in 2020, the saffron party said the city government hiked the construction cost by Rs 326 crore, 53% more than the original tender amount, without floating a new tender.
Alleging that the Delhi government counted toilets as classrooms to inflate figures related to school infrastructure, it said the Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) education model was actually an “extortion model”.
