'Cong, AAP didn't do anything to regularise colonies'

Senior BJP leader Vijay Goel on Thursday attacked the Congress and the ruling AAP in Delhi, saying the two parties had "fooled" the people on the issue of regularising unauthorised colonies.

The Unauthorised Colony Mahasangh led by the BJP leader held a protest at Jantar Mantar on the issue and accused Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) supremo Arvind Kejriwal of "misleading" the people on regularisation of unauthorised colonies.

Besides Goel, BJP MPs Hans Raj Hans and Parvesh Sahib Singh Verma were part of the demonstration.

Goel said 'padyatras' (foot marches) would be held in the unauthorised colonies in the days to come to expose "the betrayal and double-standards of CM Kejriwal".

He said Kejriwal is fooling the public in the same way the Sheila Dikshit government did in the run-up to the 2008 assembly polls when it had provided false provisional regularisation certificates to regularise 1,200 colonies.

"There are 1,797 unauthorised colonies in Delhi and 7 lakh people are living in them. The Congress was in power for 15 years while the AAP has been in power for five years. They have not done anything for regularisation of unauthorised colonies," Goel said.

When the Centre formed a panel headed by the lieutenant governor to recommend parameters for regularisation of unauthorised colonies and it came out with a report, Kejriwal felt that he could "fool" the people and take credit for the work done by the central government, the BJP leader claimed.

"The people of Delhi cannot be fooled. The regularisation of such colonies can only happen when there is a BJP government in the national capital. It will work in tandem with the BJP-led NDA government at the Centre. Kejriwal does not cooperate with the Centre," he added.

The former Delhi BJP chief said it was due to Kejriwal's "lies" that the AAP has only managed to win elections once.

At the protest, slogans like 'Humara CM kaisa ho, Vijay Goel jaisa ho' were also raised.

Hans also accused Kejriwal of "betraying" Delhiites and not taking any concrete steps for regularisation of such colonies.

"Since the Kejriwal government has failed to finish the delineation work, the Centre would now take up the work of carrying out the survey using drones and remote sensing technology," he said.

Verma said instead of exhibiting a confrontationist attitude, had Kejriwal worked in cooperation with the Centre over the past four years, the colonies would have been regularised by now.

"But instead of working for the welfare of Delhiites the chief minister kept on blaming the Centre for everything under the sun to further his own political ambitions," he alleged.

Earlier this week, Union Housing and Urban Affairs Minister Hardeep Singh Puri had accused the Delhi government of trying to take credit for regularising these colonies.

However, Kejriwal had said that the Centre can take credit, but the AAP dispensation just wants regularisation done so that people living there can get their rights.