Former Union minister and BJP MP Ravi Shankar Prasad on Thursday alleged that the ‘cockroach protest’ was being run indirectly for the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), describing it as a staged political spectacle.
He said the protest began in the morning and was later joined by AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal and others. Prasad also claimed that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and Left parties subsequently joined in, and accused the participants of troubling Delhi residents for the past three to four days.
Prasad defended the voter list verification exercise, referring to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) as a legal process that has been carried out multiple times. He argued that deceased persons cannot remain on electoral rolls, and that voters must be registered only in the constituency where they reside, without being enrolled in more than one place.
Citing recent election results, he said the BJP had won in Assam and Nandigram, and that the BJP-led alliance had won in Puducherry. He asserted that while the party is not against protests, the country is governed by Parliament and not by the streets, and claimed that attempts to create disorder had been rejected by the public.
