Kejriwal protests near Delhi CM's residence over demolition

New Delhi, Dec 7:

leader

and scores of people staged a sit-in near Chief Minister

residence on Friday to protest against demolition of buildings in a south Delhi locality and demanded that they be given an audience with her. Over 100 people started gathering at Dikshit's Motilal Nehru Marg residence at 7 am while Kejriwal joined them an hour later to protest demolition of their houses in Shaheenbagh.

A large number of police personnel were deployed at the spot to avoid any untoward incident. Police barricaded one side of road from Janpath side which has the entry gate to Dikshit's residence. Protesters shouted slogans against the government action. "The land where these people are living is there land, they have documents of it. But it's unauthorised because you have to get the map passed by the government," Kejriwal said.

"But on Oct 4, 2010, Sonia Gandhi had announced that 1,600 colonies will be regularised, this colony is also one of them. But despite that 500 houses were demolished," he said. He alleged showrooms nearby were not razed. "We were asking for Dikshit's time which was not given. We are not here for a clash with the government but a sit-in protest," he said.

PTI