NEW DELHI: Aam Aadmi Party’s Delhi unit president, Saurabh Bharadwaj, on Monday, criticised the government’s decision to make Saheli Pink Smart Cards, alleging that this would snatch Purvanchali women of their rights.
Bharadwaj alleged that when every woman living in the city was already travelling free in DTC buses without discrimination, there was no justification for making smart cards mandatory.
Bharadwaj, in a video message on X, said, “Chief Minister Rekha Gupta is making a new mockery. She says that now women will be given a Pink Card instead of a Pink Ticket.”
Till now, any woman, irrespective of her native state and residing in Delhi, would board a bus and avail a free Pink Ticket. However, now they will have to get a Pink Card, he said.
The BJP government has exposed its discriminatory mindset towards women from Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Haryana and other states, he added.
Raising a question over the expense of making Pink Cards, he said the government has not clarified which women will get this card and which will not.
Claiming that the government will demand a Delhi-based Aadhaar card to make the card, Bharadwaj said that lakhs of women from Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Purvanchal who live in Delhi still have cards from their original states. He alleged that the BJP was deliberately engineering conspiracies to strip poor Purvanchalis of their rights, claiming the move was being falsely projected as a major achievement when it was, in fact, a shameful act against vulnerable communities.