New Delhi, Feb 15: Two days after the Delhi cabinet passed a resolution seeking statehood, BJP today attacked the Sheila Dikshit-led Congress government alleging that it was enacting the "drama" to conceal its "failures and corruption in all areas."

BJP spokesman Vijay Kumar Malhotra, addressing a joint press conference with Delhi BJP president Madan Lal Khurana here, also took strong exception to Dikshit's "attack" on Delhi Lt Governor Vijai Kapoor and charged her with trying to "snatch" his powers along with those of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). "Sheila Dikshit government has been in power for the last four-and-a-half years. All this time she never thought of statehood," he said.

"As assembly elections are approaching, she (Dikshit) is enacting the drama of powers and statehood to cover her government's failures and corruption on all fronts," Malhotra charged while asserting that BJP stuck by its demand for statehood.
Claiming that Dikshit was enjoying "maximum" powers as against all earlier chief ministers of Delhi, he said, "It does not behold a chief minister to accuse the lt governor or the Centre or try to snatch powers of the MCD."

Khurana, former chief minister of Delhi, said that during his tenure there was a lot of "high-handedness" by the Centre towards the city government "but we never attacked the Lt Governor."

"Sahib Singh Verma and myself were not even provided official residences as chief ministers even as we kept asking. But it is not so with regard to Dikshit," he said.

Bureau Report