New Delhi: Blocking the rolling bulldozers in Delhi's Jahangirpuri on Wednesday, CPM (Communist Party of India (Marxist)) leader Brinda Karat fiercely waved Supreme Court order papers in the face of the 'anti-encroachers' who refused to stop their demolition drive despite the SC orders issued earlier today. The leader reached Block C of the area where encroachment was still underway on Tuesday afternoon, and managed to stop the bulldozers in action after a four-hour-long standoff wherein a team of 14 civic bodies continued the demolition drive citing 'no court orders in hand'.
In an exclusive conversation with ETV Bharat after the incident, Karat said what the government is doing is not only illegal, but an insult to the law, the Indian Constitution, and the Supreme Court. "The BJP government is audaciously targeting one particular community. If it is really only about action against encroachment, the poor people whose shops were demolished should have been given time to respond with some prior notice about the encroachment," she said. Adding that the demolition was still underway when she reached Jahangirpuri, she said that it stopped only after she showed the papers to the officials who reached there after she blocked the bulldozer.
"I know Jahangirpuri for the past 40 years, since its inception. The people here are working class, and they work very hard to earn an honest living. The small shops that they set are their only financial assets. They have already faced massive losses because of the pandemic, and now the government destroyed their sheds, shops, their entire livelihoods. It's wrong, especially because they (government) did it selectively -- targeted one particular community, in a particular block of the area," she said.
