Sisodia, Mishra detained during anti-demonetisation march
NEW DELHI: Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia and his state Cabinet colleague Kapil Mishra were detained near Parliament on Tuesday when they were leading a protest march against the Centre’s demonetisation decision. Sisodia, who was leading protesters to gherao Parliament, said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had assured that currency ban will end terrorist funding but reports said that terrorists have been caught with new Rs 2,000 notes.
Earlier, the Deputy CM met relatives of a man who died while waiting in a queue outside a bank in the Capital’s Najafgarh area where he blamed the PM for these deaths.
“There is a PM who keeps changing clothes and there is the “aam aadmi” who has been made to stand in lines to change notes,” he attacked.
Sisodia, along with hundreds of AAP workers and supporters, held a demonstration against the Centre’s demonetisation scheme at Jantar Mantar on Tuesday from where they marched towards Parliament. The Delhi Police refused to allow the march to proceed beyond Parliament Street police station and detained a few of them including the Deputy CM and Delhi Water Minister Kapil Mishra. The leaders were taken to Parliament Street police station from where they were later released.
Addressing a gathering before his detention, Sisodia said: “Production has come to a complete standstill and workers have lost their livelihoods. Traders have no goods to trade in, so markets have shut down. Farmers have no money to resume sowing, and the season has come to an end. The situation is very bad even in the outskirts of Delhi, I shudder to think what is happening in the rural hinterlands,” said Sisodia while addressing the gathering at Jantar Mantar.
“The AAP has been opposing the demonetisation drive right from the beginning because the party believes it is a massive scam, aimed to milk lakhs of crores of funds from honest citizens of this country, in order to write off old loans and finance the Prime Minister’s large industrialist friends. National Convener Arvind Kejriwal also spoke during his address to the nation on the issue mentioning that “Demonetisation is a scam worth Rs 8 lakh crore, the largest scam ever in India’s history,” added the Deputy CM.
Launching a scathing attack, Delhi Water Minister Kapil Mishra said: “Even as chaos and panic spreads across the country and the death toll linked to demonetisation goes on increasing, the Centre does not seem to have any answers to problems being faced by the people. The common man has been the worst hit as a result of this move, with severe cash crunch resulting in shutting down of factories, markets, etc. The AAP demands a full rollback of the scheme to ensure that no more deaths happen and instant relief is provided to those affected by it. The party does not believe that the Modi government has the will to take any concrete steps against black money and corruption and that demonetisation is a smoke screen to hide their failures.”