Lucknow: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is not contesting the UP Assembly elections but that is not going to stop Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal from campaigning against the BJP in the state.
Mr Kejriwal, while addressing a rally in Lucknow on Sunday, asked people not to vote for BJP and teach a lesson to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for making them stand in queues to withdraw their own hard earned money.
“Uttar Pradesh gave 71 seats to BJP in the Lok Sabha elections and this enabled the BJP to form government at the Centre. It is the duty of the people of Uttar Pradesh to teach the BJP a lesson now,” he said.
Mr Kejriwal said even the staunchest supporters of the BJP had turned against the party due to the impact of demonetisation.
“I met a person who had been voting for the BJP since the past 30 years but he said that he would not vote for any party but the BJP because of the sufferings his family went through due to demonetisation,” he said.
The Delhi chief minister also attacked Mr Modi on the government’s reported move to exempt political parties from income tax regulations while depositing demonetised currency notes in their bank accounts.
He demanded an independent commission to probe the bank accounts of all the political parties over the last five years.
“Nearly 70 per cent of the donations received by the BJP are in cash and I want to ask the Prime Minister to first tell his party workers to take donations through cheques. Then we will also go cashless”, he said.
He also accused Modi of receiving bribes from corporate leaders while he was the Gujarat Chief Minister.
