With two of his key party leaders in jail, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is all set to go into offensive mode with a combative mood.
AAP national convenor and Delhi Chief minister Arvind Kejriwal announced on Wednesday, March 1, that it will launch a door-to-door campaign against the alleged “vendetta” politics of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).
After meeting his party leaders, MLAs and councillors, CM Kejriwal said that the AAP will begin an unprecedented agitation, starting with Jansamvaad, Nukkad Sabhas and door-to-door campaigns in Delhi and across the country.
“All of us will go to every household, every doorstep and explain to them how the central government has brought back Indira Gandhi’s Emergency Era today,” CM Kejriwal said.
“It is a fact that when oppression takes a toll, nature takes its course. History has it, whenever a ruler has wielded oppression, the public has swept them out of power. It is upon the public to wield the broom now, and sweep this mess clean,” the AAP supremo said.
CM Kejriwal met his party leaders following the 5-day CBI custody of Delhi Deputy Chief minister Manish Sisodia in relation to the now-scrapped Delhi excise policy case.
Following Sisodia’s arrest, the former Delhi education minister and another key AAP leader, Satyendar Jain, who has been in jail for the past 10 months in relation to a money laundering case, tendered their resignations from the Delhi cabinet.
CM Kejriwal stated that the BJP has been restless since AAP won the Punjab elections and has been trying to settle scores with the party.
“The Aam Aadmi Party is a storm. No wall, or mountain in the world is strong enough to stop this storm. No one can stop the idea, whose time has come. AAP’s time has come. No one can stop us,” CM Kejriwal thundered.
“AAP will go door-to-door and explain to people how the central government has brought back Indira Gandhi’s emergency era with its vendetta politics,” he said.
CM Kejriwal said over the course of the last year, two AAP stalwarts, Jain and Sisodia, were maliciously taken into custody by the central agencies in completely fabricated cases.
“Not just the Aam Aadmi Party but the whole country takes pride in the work delivered by both of these leaders. They both revolutionised the health and education sectors of Delhi,” CM Kejriwal said.
“Satyendar Ji gave a new model of primary health care to the world, through his Mohalla clinics. Manish Ji transformed government schools to such an extent that the wife of the US President came to see the change herself. They both made the country proud on the highest global stages, but in return, they were sent to jail,” he added.
Reiterating the party’s stand, he asserted that there has been no scam in the excise policy. “These people are alleging that Manish Ji took bribes from liquor vendors. In one debate they will say he took 100 crores, in one they said 1000 crores, 10,000 crores in another,” CM Kejriwal said.
“They raided the house of Manish Sisodia, they tore apart his mattresses and bedding, broke down walls and found nothing. They raided Manish Ji’s Chacha-Tau-Mama-Mausi, every relative they could find, they searched his bank locker and they found nothing,” he said.
“If someone manages to amass 100 crores, you’d find a couple of crores lying here and there. A couple of lakhs become petty cash. They could not produce even ₹10,000 from him because he did not take even one rupee’s worth of favours from someone,” the Delhi CM said.