Haryana govt blocked Yamuna water supply to Delhi, Atishi alleges; BJP hits back

New Delhi: Delhi Cabinet Minister Atishi on Wednesday alleged the BJP has hatched a "new conspiracy" to target AAP and through its Haryana government has stopped water supply to the national capital.

Hitting back at the Water Minister Atishi, Delhi BJP president Virendra Sachdeva said "Fearing its defeat in the Lok Sabha polls, the AAP has come out with a new lie. When we raised the issue of the water supply crisis on Monday the minister did not utter a word and now she is blaming the BJP."

This comes as Atishi, while addressing a press conference, said the BJP has been hatching conspiracies to target AAP ever since the Lok Sabha polls were announced.

"Within five days of the announcement of Lok Sabha polls, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal was arrested so that the AAP could not campaign in the polls. After he came out on interim bail, they used the party's Rajya Sabha MP Swati Maliwal to frame him but even that plan did not work,” Atishi said.

"Then they raked up the old issue of foreign funding to the party and now through their Haryana government, the BJP has stopped the supply of Yamuna water to Delhi," she alleged.

Sachdeva further alleged that "Delhi CM Kejriwal had written a letter to her from Tihar a month ago to address the issues of water supply. She should tell what was done in the past month. The corruption and inaction of the AAP government is responsible for the shortage of water in Delhi."

Atishi said the matter came to light after they started receiving complaints of water shortage even from those areas where such issues had never risen before. She said they would write to the Haryana government on Wednesday itself. If there is no action on their part, they will move an urgent application to the Supreme Court.

"The Yamuna level mostly remains at 674 feet at Wazirabad and even when it is at the lowest it remains at 672 feet. But on May 11, it was at 671.6 feet and remained at that level for three days. On May 14 and 15, it was at 671.9 feet and then on May 16 it came down to 671.3 feet and then it further declined to 671 feet in the subsequent three days,” Atishi said.

"On May 21, maybe for the first time in history, Yamuna's water level came down to 670.9 feet," she added.  Atishi further accused the BJP of doing this to "tarnish the image of the AAP government" and "to trouble the people of Delhi".

"They want to create a water crisis in the capital. I want to warn the people of Delhi that in the coming days till May 25, more such things will happen. They will do this to manipulate voters. I want to tell BJP that you cannot fool the people of Delhi," she said.