New Delhi [India], January 12 : Union Minister Ramdas Athawale on Saturday hit out at Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convenor Arvind Kejriwal, calling the former Delhi Chief Minister's demand to include the state's Jat community in the OBC list is a "false demand."
Speaking to ANI, Athawale asserted that it is the state government's responsibility to decide which community to include in the list before sending the proposal to the central government.
"Arvind Kejriwal has been the Chief Minister thrice. The state government decides which community to include in which list, after which they send a proposal to the Center... Arvind Kejriwal is lying. He has not done the work of giving justice to the Jat community," Athawale told ANI.
He further claimed that Arvind Kejriwal is only using that demand because he feels that the time has come for him to be out of power.
"The time has come for him to come out of power, so he feels that now the Jat community should be included in OBC... This is his false demand," Athawale added.
Earlier, former Delhi Chief Minister Kejriwal had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, urging him to include Delhi's Jat community in the OBC list of the Centre. Kejriwal accused the BJP-led central government of "cheating" the community in the name of OBC reservation for the last 10 years.
Additionally, speaking on the upcoming Delhi Assembly elections, Athawale reiterated his support for the NDA and said that his party will contest seats while also making sure the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) does not lose votes.
"We are contesting elections on 15-20 seats but BJP should not suffer any loss, my party is in NDA, and we support BJP, NDA. Our role is to ensure that the BJP government comes here...," he said.
Athawale also criticised Kejriwal further, accusing his government of corruption during his tenure. "There have been scams during Arvind Kejriwal's tenure... Now the report that has come shows that Arvind Kejriwal's government was corrupt, so we demand to remove Arvind Kejriwal and bring the BJP to power," he said.
The Delhi assembly polls will be held in a single phase on February 5 and the counting of votes will take place on February 8.
A three-way contest is on the cards in Delhi between the ruling AAP, BJP and Congress.
Congress, which was in power for 15 consecutive years in Delhi, has suffered setbacks in the last two assembly elections and has failed to win any seat. Whereas AAP dominated the 2020 assembly elections by winning 62 out of 70 seats while the BJP got eight seats.
Earlier on Saturday, the BJP released its second list of 29 candidates for the upcoming elections.