Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh with party leader Ambika Soni in Patiala on Sunday. (PTI photo)
Ahead of Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal's visit to Punjab tomorrow, state Congress chief Amarinder Singh today alleged the leader failed to keep a majority of promises he made to the Delhi electorate and accused him of "befooling" people.
Mr Singh was referring to Mr Kejriwal's statement after becoming the Delhi Chief Minister that it would not be bad if his government fulfilled even "about half the promises", made before the polls, in five years.
"If your intentions are such that you really don't mean to fulfil all the promises, then why make such promises in the first instance and befool the people. This is wilful cheating," the state Congress chief said.
Mr Kejriwal's visit is part of AAP's 'Punjab Dialogue' aimed at studying various issues for preparing the party's manifesto for the 2017 Assembly polls.
Terming 'Punjab Dialogue' as a show of "political theatrics", Mr said, "It is quite natural for a party which has no roots but just a few shoots in Punjab to struggle to identify the issues."
"If you really don't know what issues and problems are ailing Punjab you really don't have any right to claim to represent Punjabis," he said, adding "if you think of bringing half-hatched eggs from outside for the local mule ducks to hatch here, you will be badly disappointed."
Mr Singh said AAP claims to go to each and every of the 12,581 villages in Punjab to seek opinion of the people and find out the issues which is virtually impractical and impossible.
"Do you really prepare manifestos like that," he asked.
The state Congress chief said, "You really don't need to visit 12,581 villages to know about the problems of people as everybody everywhere knows what is ailing Punjab."
"That is why I have been insisting that Punjab cannot afford any new experiment with the people who have no experience, no competence, no knowledge and not even any roots in Punjab," he added.