Amit Shah attacks AAP over donations

New Delhi, Feb 5 (IANS) BJP president Amit Shah Thursday attacked the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on the issue of donations and questioned it for "falling back" on its promises.

"How did you (AAP) not know about Rs.20 million donation given to you? Tomorrow you will say Dawood (underworld don Dawood Ibrahim) gave you the money but you don't know about it," Shah said in an interview to CNN-IBN.

Observing that the AAP has a political affairs committee to probe the donations over Rs.one million, he said: "It (AAP) said it will investigate all the donations given to it, how can it has not inquired about a donation of Rs.five million."

The BJP president claimed that the AAP is using black money in its poll campaign in Delhi, according to a release issued by the channel.

Shah also said that the AAP has always betrayed the people and fallen back on its promises.

"It (AAP) is answerable to the people over why it did not fulfil its promises. It said it will hold 'Jan Sabhas' every week, but that did not happen, it said no minister will travel in executive class but that did not happen. AAP leaders said they will not take any bungalow but they backtracked," he said.

He said that the AAP has been blowing its own trumpet by giving victory to itself in its opinion polls.

"It is right that opinion polls vary, but Delhi has diverse voters and no opinion poll can predict Delhi voter's mood. Even in Lok Sabha, we didn't get good predictions about Delhi but we (BJP) got all seven seats," he said.

On criticism of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for not having a manifesto for the Delhi polls, he said that the vision document of the party was not different.

"Both the manifesto and vision document are the same thing. There is no difference between the two. Both have the outlook of the party," he said.

On the issue of not mentioning about the full statehood for Delhi in the vision document, he said the issue should not be trivialised by bringing it up during the election.

"Full statehood should not be brought during the polls. That is something to be discussed by all stakeholders in a detailed manner. It should not be made a political issue," he said.

Shah also said the Delhi polls were not a referendum on Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "For us (BJP) every election is important and we take every election seriously. Development can only happen under the BJP."

He said the Delhi BJP unit became stronger with Kiran Bedi's inclusion. She is known for fighting corruption and crime and is a social worker. "We will benefit from her image."