LG office sit-in: More support pours in, boosts Arvind Kejriwal, AAP morale

NEW DELHI: Support has poured in from leaders of various political parties and intellectuals for Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal and ministers sitting on dharna outside LG Anil Baijal’s office in Raj Niwas for the last four days.
The flow of support has emboldened Kejriwal and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) determined to continue the strike unless the demands are met even if it requires staying put at the Raj Niwas for long. On the BJP MLAs teaming up with AAP rebel MLA Kapil Mishra for a dharna at Kejriwal's office, former UP CM Akhilesh Yadav said: “The ruling party capturing CM’s office is pointing to a situation worse than the murder of democracy.”

Tamil actor Kamal Haasan, former Bihar deputy CM Tejaswi Yadav, CPI (M) functionary Sitaram Yechury, historian Ramachandra Guha were among the prominent persons who threw their weight behind AAP’s demands that the Centre’s hostility towards its elected government should end and the bureaucrats should cooperate with the elected government. West Bengal CM Mamata Banerjee and former union minister Yashwant Sinha have already backed the protest.

Taking to Twitter to back Kejriwal, Yechury attacked the Centre. “BJP central government is using the office of the LG to obstruct the elected state government in Delhi to discharge its constitutional duties. This is despicable. The Centre must abandon this course of the confrontation right away,” he tweeted. Hasan called the development “interference in the functioning of an elected government” and said it is unacceptable in a democracy. In fact what is happening in Delhi and in TN/Pondicherry is not too different,” Hasan said on Twitter.

Recalling how the then “PM AB Vajpayee did not treat the elected Government of Delhi in the 2000s with hostility or contempt” Guha said on twitter that the “Modi regime should do likewise.” It prompted Kejriwal to hope that “Modi will also follow in the footsteps of Vajpayee and allow opposition-ruled states to work for the people.”

Kejriwal and ministers have put up three demands -- one, direct all IAS officers to end their four-month-long “strike”; two, initiate proceedings against those on “strike”; and three, approve the scheme for doorstep delivery of rations.

RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav also took on the Centre and accused it of being dictator and making made a “mockery of democracy” in Delhi and Puducherry.