A group of Punjabi women were arrested by Delhi police on Saturday for demonstrating outside the home of Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convenor Arvind Kejriwal. The demonstration was a reaction to the AAP government’s unmet promises to Punjabi women, namely the vow to offer financial support.
Speaking to the media, one of the jailed ladies bemoaned the broken promises. “We traveled from Amritsar to present our issues,” she stated. Don’t treat Delhi ladies the same way you treated Punjabi women. “Do not promise Rs 2100 to the women of Delhi,” she said.
A group of Punjabi women organized the demonstration, claiming that the AAP-led Punjab government had not fulfilled its pledge to give every woman in the state Rs 1,000 a month.
Punjab accuses Arvind Kejriwal of breaching promises.
“We came from Punjab’s Gurdaspur,” one Gurdaspur protester said, expressing her displeasure. The people there are impoverished, and Arvind Kejriwal and Bhagwant Mann pledged to provide each lady with Rs 1000. They lied to create the government. Several other women who participated in the demonstration shared this feeling, expressing their annoyance with the AAP government’s unmet financial pledge.
The Women’s Scheme in Delhi Causes Controversy
The demonstration took place in the midst of mounting controversy around the Delhi government’s introduction of the “Mukhya Mantri Mahila Samman Yojana,” a program that was intended to give women in Delhi Rs 2,100 per month. Arvind Kejriwal promised women financial help when he announced the scheme’s registration opening on December 22. But when the Delhi government’s Women and Child Development (WCD) department stated that no such plan had been formally approved, confusion ensued, and charges of political manipulation and false promises followed.
Delhi Chief Minister Atishi responded to these events by accusing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of exerting pressure on Delhi government staff to carry out the plan. “These notifications are fake,” she said. We’ll take action against those in charge of issuing them.
Arvind Kejriwal is accused of election timing and data misuse.
To make matters more complicated, Delhi Lieutenant Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena on December 27 ordered an investigation into claims that “non-government” organizations were gathering personal information about Delhi residents in order to register them for the AAP’s proposed “Mahila Samman Yojana.” The investigation has brought into question how sensitive data is handled and whether personal data is being misused for political purposes.
As Delhi prepares for assembly elections, which are anticipated to be held in February 2025, the protest and the ensuing disputes occur. The capital’s political climate is already becoming more heated, even though the Election Commission has not yet revealed the official dates.
The decline of Congress and the rise of the AAP
In the previous two assembly elections, the Congress party, which ruled Delhi for 15 years in a row, has struggled and failed to win any seats. In comparison, the BJP only managed to get eight seats in the 2020 elections, while the AAP pulled off an astounding success, securing 62 out of 70 seats. As a result, Delhi’s contemporary political landscape is characterized by a conflict between the AAP and the BJP, with these pledges and demonstrations greatly influencing popular sentiment.
The women of Delhi and Punjab are still speaking out against the political theater, demanding answers and responsibility from the politicians they trusted.
