Kadipur, a village in Northwest Delhi was declared a free Wi-Fi zone on Monday. The estimated five kilometre Wi-Fi area was inaugurated by local councillor Urmila Rana and an NGO, ‘Mridul’, which is allegedly associated with Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari, according to a report by Aaj Tak tv channel.
The report claims that after winning the North-east Delhi Lok Sabha constituency in the 2014, Tiwari “adopted” Kadipur village in a central government programme.
The Quint reached out to Manoj Tiwari to clarify the matter, but is yet to receive a response.
The free Wi-Fi initiative is supposed to benefit an estimated 1,000 people, and to this end, 25 servers and one main unit has been installed. With a speed of 5 Mbps, the Wi-Fi will be accessible 24 hours. In order to avail of this scheme, individuals need to register their telephone numbers.
The report also says that, despite becoming the first village in Delhi to have access to free Wi-Fi, the village still suffers from an acute water shortage. Allegedly, water does not reach the village for two consecutive days at times.
Aaj Tak reached out to local councillor Urmila Rana, who allegedly transferred the blame to AAP over Kadipur’s water crisis, while taking credit for providing free Wi-Fi to the village.
Rana allegedly claimed that since the Water Board falls under AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal’s jurisdiction, it is his responsibility to ensure water supply to Kadipur. Since its win in 2015, one of the key promises of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was to make Delhi a Wi-Fi city. But nearly two and a half years hence, that promise is yet to be fulfilled.
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