As Delhi crumbles, Kejriwal's 'gone on 10-day deep sleep', Congress's Ajay Maken says

NEW DELHI: Wondering why it's relatively quiet on the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) front?

It's because Delhi's voluble AAP chief minister Arvind Kejriwal is in Dharamsala , not speaking and not tweeting.

Kejriwal arrived in Dharamsala on Monday evening for a 10-day vipassana course . The main component of such a course is usually complete silence.

Not everyone's happy about Kejriwal going AWOL.

Congress leader Ajay Maken criticized Kejriwal Monday evening for taking time off and for going "on a 10-day deep sleep ".


He also started #JaagoYaBhaago, a Twitter campaign against the AAP government in Delhi. Kejriwal went for a similar vipassana course after the Lok Sabha elections in May 2014.



The Dharamsala Vipassana centre's spokesman Pawan Sharma said over the weekend that Kejriwal's course will start on the morning of Tuesday, August 2 and continue till the evening of August 11.

The Delhi chief minister won't undertake any official work and will not have access to newspapers, television or any other media during the 10-day course, the centre's Sharma said.

The Congress's Maken completely disapproves of such trips, going by what he told PTI Monday evening.

"Monsoon is the most crucial time for any city and in this time it is very sad that the CM is going for meditation. His main priority should be Delhi and its people who showed faith in him ... The city is facing problems like water-logging and diseases, Delhi needs its CM the most," the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee chief said, according to PTI.

Maken didn't spare Prime Minister Narendra Modi either.

"Both the PM and the CM failed in fulfilling their responsibility towards Delhi and their voters. Modiji is busy visiting the world and Kejriwal is busy visiting India. When both are here they are busy fighting ," Maken said Monday.

Upon his arrival in Dharamsala on Monday, mere hours before he had to stop talking and consuming any form of media, Kejriwal decided to make full use of the time he had left - before his 'verbal and tweet fast' - and tweeted about Gujarat's BJP chief minister Anandiben Patel's resignation .

In fact, the DElhi CM shot off two tweets in quick succession - the second one more dramatic than the first - almost as if it had just struck him that for 10 days he can't mouth off, literally or digitally.

First, he wrote that the Gujarat chief minister's resignation is a sure sign that the BJP is terrified of AAP 's growing popularity in Gujarat. The state's Assembly election is expected to be held in December next year.



Kejriwal's second tweet, in quick succession, said that Anandiben's resignation is a victory for AAP's anti-corruption efforts in Gujarat.