The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has lambasted PWD Minister Parvesh Verma for visiting Connaught Place on Sunday in a belated and meaningless inspection—a day after rainwater had receded from the streets. Party’s Delhi President Saurabh Bharadwaj said Parvesh Verma “woke up 24 hours after the city drowned” and was now “looking for potholes” instead of having been on the ground when people were dying.
Pointing to Saturday’s deaths from a collapsed wall and an open sewer, Saurabh Bharadwaj said the minister should be visiting bereaved families, not dry roads — adding that if he truly wanted to see waterlogging, “he should have gone out with an umbrella during the rain.”
In a press conference, AAP Delhi State President Saurabh Bharadwaj said that on Saturday, several parts of Delhi were waterlogged due to heavy rainfall, yet Minister Parvesh Verma is going for an “inspection” on Sunday, long after the water has receded. “Does Parvesh Verma even own a watch? Someone should gift him one. Which time zone is he living in? The waterlogging happened on Saturday, a child drowned in an open sewer on Saturday, and now, on Sunday—when not a single drop of water is on the streets—he is going to inspect Connaught Place. Who exactly is he trying to fool?”
The AAP Delhi Unit Chief further questioned why the minister has not visited the families of the seven people who died when a wall collapsed due to flooding. “Will he not go to the home of the two-and-a-half-year-old boy whose sisters kept searching for him on Raksha Bandhan, only to find that he had drowned in a sewer under the minister’s own department? Now he will not find water on the streets. If he really wants to see waterlogging, he needs to step out with an umbrella while it is raining,” he added.
Saurabh Bharadwaj noted, “The same thing happened last time—rain poured all day, and when it stopped in the evening, CM Rekha Gupta went for an inspection. The BJP government has turned Delhi into a joke.”
