Cleaning mission or photo-op?: Delhi BJP litters street before sweeping it off for Swachh Bharat

New

, Nov 6: The Delhi's BJP unit has turned red-faced after media revealed that the

cleaning drive they undertook on Wednesday was merely a photo-op. The media photographs showed garbage being dumped on a Delhi pavement some time before the cleaning drive, led by party's state unit chief Satish Upadhyay, began.

To make it worse, the Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday referred to the photographs in an interview with NDTV. The AAP leader said, "Satish Upadhyay first had the streets littered and then cleaned. The BJP in Delhi has committed fraud on the PM's Swachh Bharat campaign", said the NDTV report.

Shazia Ilmi, ex-member of the Aam Aadmi Party, had also taken part in the cleanliness drive which took place outside the India Islamic Cultural Centre (IICC) in the city.

Upadhyay, however, said he or his party knew nothing about the garbage being dumped on the side-walk to stage the cleaning drive. He said he and his colleagues went there on the invitation of the Islamic Centre. Upadhyay was backed by Ilmi who said she was there on the Centre's invitation. She added that she stayed there only "for five minutes."

The cleaning drive 'Swachh Bharat mission' was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on October 2, this year with an aim to ensure proper sanitation in urban and rural India. As part of the campaign, several celebrities and politicians hit the streets with broom, cleaning up their locality. Amitabh Bachhan, Salman Khan, Shashi Tharoor, Omar Abdullah, Anil Ambani etc are some of the celebrities who joined the mission.

Oneindia News