Senior Aam Aadmi Party leader Kumar Vishwas, without taking any names, indirectly criticised the AAP government in Delhi and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on corruption.
“If after riding the plank of anti-corruption to form a government in Delhi, your own people indulge in corruption and if you (the leader) try to save them and issue no statements, people will question you,” he said in a veiled reference to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal.
In a video message posted on Friday, Vishwas also requested the listeners to take note of his message rather than his profession as a poet or politician.
Citing history, Vishwas went on to add that our preference for our political leaders led to divisions in our country. “We mostly focus on our leaders instead of our issues. Modi-Modi, Arvind-Arvind, Rahul-Rahul, yeh saare bas kuch saal rahenge, par desh 5,000 saal ka hai.”
Interestingly, Kejriwal retweeted the video saying, “Bohot shandaar video. Andar tak hilaa deta hai. Zaroor dekhein (Brilliant video that will shake you to the core. Must watch).”
Vishwas starts off the 13-minute video by speaking on the recent violence in Kashmir during the Srinagar bypoll and the low voter turnout in the region.
The AAP leader said the government must introspect why the people of Kashmir did not choose to vote. “If you gather votes in the name of nationalism and then if the nation’s sons are slapped, people will question you,” Vishwas said in reference to the video of a CRPF personnel heckled by Kashmiri youth.
While speaking on farmer suicides, Vishwas also recalls the incident when a Rajasthan farmer, Gajendra Singh, committed suicide during an AAP rally in Jantar Mantar.
“Hum jantar mantar pe baithe the. Hamare saamne bhi ek kisaan phaansi pe jhool gaya tha. Hamein bhi neend aana bandh hogayi thi. Lekin kya ispe koi corrective measures utha sakta hai? (A farmer committed suicide in front of us when we were at Jantar Mantar. We couldn’t sleep for some time after that. But can some correct measures be taken on the issue?)” he asked. He then critcised the government for failing to recover the debt from large corporate holdings.
In his video, Vishwas also took on the Modi government for failing to accord Pakistan the status of a terrorist nation. “Why doesn’t this government declare Pakistan as a terrorist nation in the Parliament and decide that they won’t hold any more talks? Instead, the government has bestowed the Business status of Most Favoured Nation to it,” he claimed.