In the run up to the hotly contested MCD elections, AAP and Arvind Kejriwal have tried all sort of stunts to deflect blame, but have been thwarted at every stage. This is not new to Kejriwal who is adept at spreading outright lies for any sort of political gain. But things were taken a bit too far today.
As the voting ended for the MCD elections, exit polls began running on TV channels. The India Today-Axis exit poll predicted that the BJP could win between 202 and 220 seats, with AAP and the Congress securing around 23-35 and 19-31 seats. The CVoter-ABP exit poll gave very similar results, predicting that the BJP was likely to sweep Delhi with 218 seats, with the AAP and the Congress at 24 and 22 seats. The average of two exit polls gave the BJP 216 seats, AAP 25 seats and the Congress 26 seats.
Normally, politicians and political parties who are not given a favourable prediction by exit polls, blame the sample size, the method of collection of data and eventually deflect the issue to the actual counting day since they claim they do not believe in such predictions etc. But being “normal” just doesn’t cut it for AAP.
The first gaffe was made by AAP National Executive Member Preeti Sharma Menon. Menon is best known for her role in shielding and providing moral and legal support to Barun Kashyap, a creative director from Mumbai who had faked a Gau-Rakshak attack.
When the managing editor at ABP News Milind Khandekar tweeted out the exit poll results, Menon responded saying “Jai EVMs”, trying to allude that EVM’s, which are owned and controlled by EC, had somehow played a role in distorting the Exit Poll results, which have absolutely nothing to do with EVMs.
https://twitter.com/PreetiSMenon/status/856127252899270657
Perhaps Menon does not know that Exit polls are based on surveys conducted with voters and have no relation to EVMs. The Exit poll results would have been same irrespective of the mode of polling. Unfortunately, Menon does not get election results very well.
If that was no enough, AAP leader Ashish Khetan made matters worse, that too on national television. Last time he was confronted by journalists, he had threatened a few journalists with dire consequences. Luckily, he was calmer today but the idiocy just would go. In a TV debate about the exit polls results, Khetan said:
A suspicion arises as to why the exit polls are showing such (unfavourable to AAP) results. Is it because the EVM’s were tampered?
A video of the statement is here:
It appears both Menon and Khaitan had been taught the same response by their supremos in AAP. And the one who taught this response had not though it through. As expected, social media users tore apart AAP for this hilarious excuse. This is what BJP spokesperson Sambit Patra had to say:
https://twitter.com/sambitswaraj/status/856135651481092097
Other reactions:
https://twitter.com/rajsan2016/status/856127873878339585
https://twitter.com/manishpant/status/856157728980557824
https://twitter.com/Zarakhan_delhi/status/856154570627657728
God Bless AAP leaders for always providing timely comic relief.