Dikshit accuses Kejriwal of witch hunt

"My dream of Delhi has gone for a toss," Sheila Dikshit said today, two months after the three- term Chief Minister of Delhi was ousted from power by AAP's Arvind Kejriwal whom she accused of indulging in a "witch hunt" against her.

The 75-year-old Congress leader has just moved to a modest private apartment she has rented in the heart of the capital in sharp contrast to the sprawling government bungalow that was her home for about a decade. She now gets time to watch movies and is planning to work on interiors of the apartment herself.

Dikshit is careful with her words but her bitterness at the rout of her party and her own defeat comes through clearly. She recalls her achievements in terms of power, education, roads and hospitals, pointing out that the pass percentage in the government school was about 97 per cent, highest in the country.

"My dream of Delhi has gone for a toss already," she says after accusing Kejriwal of promising the impossible to win votes. Aam Aadmi Party had made promises of free water, cheap electricity, housing, jobs only to "backtrack from them".

Dikshit accused the AAP government, which was in power for just 49 days, of "witch hunting" by filing cases against her. Kejriwal had ordered Anti-Corruption Bureau of Delhi government to file FIR into the alleged corruption in the street light project of the 2010 Commonwealth Games in which CAG had indicted Dikshit.

"I have done nothing wrong. It is witch hunting," she said.

On another case pertaining to allegations of her misusing the public funds ahead of 2008 Assembly polls, she said, "The FIR was filed following BJP leader Vijender Gupta's complaint which has already been decided by the President of India, who said there is no case" since she was a chief minister.

"Now, they (AAP) have brought it from chief minister to an individual" thereby forcing her to defend herself, Dikshit said, expressing her anger over AAP's move.

The AAP government on Friday had moved the Delhi High Court to withdraw the appeal of previous Congress dispensation against a lower court order to register an FIR against Dikshit in the case.