Row over slum demolition: Arvind Kejriwal takes dig at Rahul Gandhi, calls him a kid

Admin 14-Dec-2015 17:24:59 Inothernews

Row over slum demolition: Arvind Kejriwal takes dig at Rahul Gandhi, calls him a kid


NEW DELHI: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Monday called Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi 'a kid' for questioning the Aam Aadmi Party's (AAP) protests over the demolition of a slum in Delhi. "Rahul Gandhi is a 'kid'. Perhaps the Congress Party did not tell him that the Indian railway comes under the ambit of the central government." Members of the AAP are protesting the demolition of a slum colony in Delhi by the Railway Ministry on Saturday. Parliamentarians of the Trinamool Congress joined AAP in the protest. Earlier, Rahul Gandhi said while criticizing AAP's protest, "Why is AAP doing dharna? They are in power in Delhi." Kejriwal plans to take up the demolition issue and the death of a baby allegedly during the demolition, with railway minister Suresh Prabhu as he is not satisfied with ministry officials' response. "In the meeting, Railway officials told the CM said that there is no rehabilitation scheme before demolition. The chief minister completely rejected the claims of the railways," a Delhi government official said. After meeting the evicted, Kejriwal said that the slum dwellers had been living there since 1992-94, but it took the ministry just a moment to demolish their homes. A six-month-old baby died in one of the slum units, which the railways insisted had "nothing to do with removal of encroachments", claiming that it occurred two hours before the demolition started at 12pm. "Those who have done this (demolition of shanties) are not humans, instead they are animals," Kejriwal said. The Delhi government ordered a magisterial probe into the demolition of the 1,200 slum units at Shakur Basti in West Delhi. The railways, on its part, said the removal of "fresh encroachment" was necessary for expanding the infrastructure and that the action had been taken after three notices, the first one with a March 14, 2015 deadline.



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