Continuing with its verbal barbs on incumbent Delhi State chief Arvind Kejriwal ahead of the upcoming assembly polls, the BJP on Monday claimed to have enough evidence to establish him as a “terrorist”.
The BJP's Delhi election in-charge and Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Prakash Javadekar said: “Kejriwal is making an innocent face and asking if he is a terrorist, you are a terrorist, there is plenty of proof for it”.
“You yourself had said you are an anarchist, there is not much difference between an anarchist and a terrorist”, he added.
The statement came as Delhi is witnessing heated political campaigns by Delhi’s governing Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the BJP.
Aam Aadmi Party leader Sanjay Singh has said: "This is happening in the capital of our country where the central gov't is sitting, the Election Commission is present. How can a central minister be permitted to use such language? If Arvind Kejriwal is a terrorist, I challenge BJP to arrest him".
The BJP has come under the scanner of the Election Commission as its members have continued to make controversial statements.
The EC recently asked the BJP to remove two of its campaigners – Parvesh Verma and Anurag Thakur – from the ongoing campaign for the Delhi elections in response to controversial remarks by them.
Last week, the Election Commission of India issued a notice to BJP parliamentarian Parvesh Verma for calling the Delhi state chief a “terrorist”.
“Chief Minister Kejriwal is a terrorist and it is important to save our daughters from him”, Verma was quoted as saying by Hindi news website Amar Ujala.
Following this, Kejriwal released a statement on how he has worked for Delhi over the past five years. He said that he has worked for improving the quality of education, healthcare, and free pilgrimage for old citizens. “Are these steps that a terrorist would take?” he had asked.
While campaigning for the Delhi polls in the city’s Rithala area in January, Thakur, the country’s junior minister for finance, made a provocative slogan that was meant as a clarion call to “shoot the traitors”, obliquely referring to those who oppose the government’s policies.
It prompted the Election Commission to ban him for 72 hours and ask the BJP to put him off the party's star campaigner list.
With election campaigning reaching a feverish pitch, all three parties – the AAP, BJP, and Congress – are making strong political speeches to win over millions of voters in Delhi. The national capital is set to go to the elections for the 70-member legislative assembly on 8 February.