AAP leaders who sought justice for Nirbhaya, now backing accused: Maliwal

AAP Rajya Sabha MP Swati Maliwal, who has been accused by her party of being part of a conspiracy to frame Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal in a false case, on Sunday said her party colleagues once sought justice for Nirbhaya but today they are supporting a person accused of assaulting her.

She said if AAP leader and former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia, who is in jail in connection with the Delhi excise police case, had been here "maybe things wouldn't have been so bad for me!"

Maliwal has alleged that Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal's aide Bibhav Kumar assaulted her on May 13 when she went to the CM's residence to meet him. The Aam Aadmi Party has trashed her allegations and claimed Maliwal was acting at the behest of the BJP to frame Kejriwal in a fake case.

Maliwal, who has been associated with the AAP since its inception more than 10 years ago, said on Sunday there was a time when "we all used to come out on the streets to get justice for Nirbhaya".

"Today, 12 years later, we have come out on the streets to save the accused (Bibhav Kumar) who made the CCTV footage disappear and formatted the phone? I wish they had used this much force for Manish Sisodia ji. Had he been here, maybe things wouldn't have been so bad for me!" she wrote.

Police have arrested Kumar in connection with the case.