The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) will be providing the wrestlers staging a protest at Jantar Mantar, demanding the arrest of the wrestling federation chief over sexual harassment charges, with cots in view of the ongoing rainy spell in Delhi.
Rains lashed the national capital on Wednesday, inundating low-lying areas and disrupting vehicular movement on key roads. The Safdarjung Observatory, Delhi's primary weather station, recorded 20.9 mm of rainfall between 8:30 am and 5:30 pm, and a maximum temperature of 30.6 degrees Celsius, nine notches below normal.
Senior AAP leader and MLA Somnath Bharti said, "On the instructions of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, we have decided to send foldable cots to the protest site. We hope that this small help will make this tough time a little bit easier for the wrestlers."
The wrestlers have been staging a sit-in at Jantar Mantar since April 23. They have levelled allegations of sexual harassment against Wrestling Federation of India (WFI) chief Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, who is also a Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP from Uttar Pradesh.
The protesters have been demanding criminal action against Singh for the alleged sexual harassment and intimidation of seven female wrestlers, one of whom is a minor. The Delhi Police filed two FIRs against the WFI president on Friday on allegations of sexual harassment levelled against him by the wrestlers. The protesting wrestlers had earlier moved the Supreme Court seeking the registration of FIRs against Singh.
