Hours after a major fire in New Delhi's Bawana Industrial Area claimed 17 lives, the Delhi Bharatiya Janata Party chief, Manoj Tiwari, on Sunday defended North Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC) Mayor Preeti Aggarwal over a video which went viral on social media. The video allegedly shows Aggarwal alerting her aides, on camera, from revealing anything over the fire as NDMC had issued the license to the factory which caught fire on Saturday evening.
In the video, Aggarwal was seen saying, "Iss factory ki licensing hamare paas hai isliye hum kuch nahi bol sakte, (We cannot say anything over it as the license of this factory was approved by us)."
#WATCH: In the aftermath of Bawana factory fire, BJP leader & North Delhi Municipal Corporation Mayor Preeti Aggarwal caught on cam telling her aide, 'iss factory ki licensing hamare paas hai isliye hum kuch nahi bol sakte.' The incident has claimed 17 lives. #Delhi pic.twitter.com/zXfVjNADl2
— ANI (@ANI) January 21, 2018
Manoj Tiwari in a tweet has, however, alleged that this a trick to malign his party's image. The BJP MP went on to say that: "It's murmuring. Only 'ye factory' is clear."
"People are trying to make that fake video viral at a sad time, just to blame BJP. CM re-tweeted it. He must apologise for such low-level politics in a time of despair," he added.
Preeti Aggarwal asked whom does the factory come under, it's murmuring, only 'ye factory' is clear. Ppl are trying to make that fake video viral at a sad time just to blame BJP. CM re tweeted it, he must apologise for such low-level politics in time of despair: Manoj Tiwari, BJP pic.twitter.com/PSmaeEyb5t
— ANI (@ANI) January 21, 2018
The NMDC Mayor has also termed the video as fake and aimed her allegations at ruling Aam Admi Party's chief Arvind Kejriwal. She took a direct dig at Kejriwal and said, "Arvind Kejriwal is tweeting and retweeting a fake video of mine and is confusing the public. This shows your (Kejriwal) poor politics. You should apologise."
Seventeen people, including 10 women, were burnt alive on Saturday evening when a massive fire engulfed an illegal firecracker factory in Bawana. The fire was doused after three hours.
The building was owned by two persons identified as Manoj Jain and Lalit Goel. "Jain has been arrested," Deputy Commissioner of Police Rajneesh Gupta told IANS. The reason behind the fire is yet to be ascertained.
