'Medical emergency' in Delhi: BJP's Manoj Tiwari

Delhi BJP MP Manoj Tiwari on Monday drove to Parliament on a bicycle and slammed Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal over a study that said supplied water in the city is not good for drinking as it failed to meet the quality parameters, adding there was a "medical emergency" in the capital.

Several BJYM supporters also held protest against the Delhi government outside Parliament with placards that read the city government failed to provide safe water for consumption to the people.

Speaking to reporters outside Parliament, Tiwari, who is an MP from Delhi northeast Lok Sabha seat, said, "In Delhi this time due to impure water and unhealthy air there is medical emergency."

Slamming Kejriwal, Tiwari said that Kejriwal used to accuse on why samples were collected only from Delhi. But this time water was collected from 20 states.

"And among them the water of Delhi was worst for consumption and Arvind Kejriwal should answer the people on the same," the BJP leader said.

To a question on Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) accusing the BJP of doing politics over the water issue, Tiwari said, "If demanding good quality water is wrong and is being described as bad politics then people of Delhi will decide."

"When people will survive then only one can do politics, here the politics of distributing death is being carried out," he added.

Tiwari's remarks came two days after Union Minister for Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Ram Vilas Paswan said that water samples were collected from 11 locations in Delhi.

According to Paswan, all the samples have failed to match the set parameters. The only metropolitan city where people can drink tap water safely is Mumbai as all its samples complied with Indian standards, the minister said.

On the directions of the ministry, the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), a national body that sets quality standards for products and services, had decided to undertake a study of the quality of piped drinking water being supplied in the country. It also framed quality standards for tap water.

In Delhi, all the 11 samples drawn did not comply with the requirements of the BIS. The samples failed on several of the parameters.

The AAP has cried foul and said that the BJP-led government at the Centre was "stooping too low by doing politics on water quality after they failed miserably in controlling air pollution in entire northern India."IANS