PM Modi attacks Kejriwal but gives a miss to women safety issue in Delhi

New Delhi: Against the assumption of many who anticipated that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will speak on trivial issues concerning the national capital such as women’s safety, statehood for Delhi and deteriorating working conditions of the municipal corporation, he rather chose to launch a lambent attack on Aam Aadmi Party and its convener Arvind Kejriwal. The city has earned the infamous tag of “rape capital”. According to recent Delhi Police data, six rape and 14 molestation cases are reported here everyday. However, the city police claim that it solved 90 percent of the cases. As per the official figures released earlier this week, the number of rape cases rose from 1571 in 2013 to 2069 in 2014, a jump of 31.70 percent while cases of molestation grew from 3345 to 4179, a hike of 25 percent. [caption id=“attachment_2040241” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  Modi chose not to talk about these issues but his every jibe was aimed at Kejriwal and company. Naresh Sharma/ Firstpost[/caption] Delhi Police Commissioner B S Bassi attributed the spurt to police registering all the complaints unlike in previous years. The year 2014 also saw a 185 percent surge in street crime - from 33,997 in 2013 to 96,922 in 2014. The national capital witnessed a whopping 200 percent rise in other crimes in the last two years. A total of 1.47 lakh cases were registered till December 15, 2014 which was almost 99.22 percent higher than the same period in 2013 and almost a 200 percent jump from 54,287 cases in 2012. Robberies, which increased to 6180 in 2014 from 1106 in 2013, grew by 459 percent. It was followed by theft and burglaries which recorded an increase of 327 and 289 percent respectively. The number of cases of snatching also grew by almost 100 per cent from 3316 in 2013 to 6944 in 2014. This deteriorating law and order situation in the city gives rise to the demand of full statehood, which will have its own police. Even this demand was raised last year by the then Delhi BJP president Dr Harsh Vardhan. After being nominated as the chief ministerial candidate of Delhi in May last year, he had said first issue he will take up for the city with the new Prime Minister would be grant of full statehood to the national capital as it will help ensure proper coordination between various agencies. In the campaign for Lok Sabha polls, the BJP had also promised to declare Delhi a full state if the party came to power Former Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal took to the streets in central Delhi to raise the same demand. He had alleged that Delhi Police officials do not cooperate with the state government and refuse to follow its instructions. “Women here keep on getting raped and the police say investigation is on but that is not enough. If a rape happens, someone has to be held accountable,” he had said. In fact, Kejriwal was not the first chief minister to demand raise this demand. His predecessor Sheila Dikshit sparred in public with then Delhi Police Commissioner Neeraj Kumar over accountability in the wake of the brutal gangrape of a physiotherapy intern in a moving bus on December 16, 2012. Delhi has serious municipal corporation issues as well. A large number of roads in the city are badly damaged and can cause fatal accidents. While civic agencies busy repairing well-maintained colony roads and service lanes, the situation is worse in East and North Delhi. There is a serious dearth of public toilets in the national capital and the existing ones are in bad condition. It appears that corporations of Delhi (East Delhi Municipal Corporation, North Delhi Municipal Corporation and South Delhi Municipal Corporation) here have no clear plan for providing better sanitation in the city. Notably, the BJP rules the civic bodies here. However, Modi chose not to talk about these issues but his every jibe was aimed at Kejriwal and company. Although he did not mention the name of Kejriwal and his political outfit in his 57 minute speech, those who have a sense of reading political language could easily get a sense of who the Prime Minister was digging at.