Want “good governance” or “anarchy” in the capital? Jaitley to Delhi

New Delhi

As Delhi heads for one of the most fiercely fought electoral battle, senior BJP leader and Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley today said his party’s main rival was Arvind Kejriwal’s AAP which has been eyeing to recapture power.

In an address to BJP workers at Viswas Nagar in east Delhi, Jaitley was severely crtical of AAP and said people of the city will have to decide whether they want “good governance” or “anarchy” in the capital.

The Finance Minister said Congress, which ruled the city for 15 years from 1998-2013, was nowhere in the the contest as people rejected the party in the last Assembly and Lok Sabha polls.

“In Delhi polls, Kejriwal is the only issue (competition).Voters need to decide whether they want good governance in Delhi or anarchy,” the Finance Minister, who has been overseeing BJP’s preparation for the polls, said.

Jaitley asked the party workers to put in their “heart and soul” in the poll campaign as only few days are remaining for the crucial polls.

Attacking Kejriwal for his protest at the Rajpath when he was the Chief Minister, Jaitley referred to his reported comments about the Republic Day during the demonstration in January last year.

“Kiran Bedi is capable of ensuring good governance and discipline. How can a Chief Minister say that he will not let the Republic Day parade happen? We will form a majority government and Congress will not be able to get few seats even to extend support to any party,” he said.

BJP leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah have been targetting AAP and its leader Arvind Kejriwal in their election rallies.

Venkaiah Naidu’s rally:

In a separate rally, Union Minister Venkaiah Naidu alleged that Kejriwal had “sweared on his children” to never join hands with the Congress but changed his stance later on.

The BJP had attacked Kejriwal with such references through print advertisements that had carried caricatures of Kejriwal along with veteran activist Anna Hazare.

“He had sweared on his children that he will not join hands with the Congress but when we declined to form the government due to lack of numbers he immediately backtracked…What happened to that vow?” Naidu asked at a rally in Mahipalpur area of Bijwasan constituency.

He said he used to respect Kejriwal and had thought the AAP chief would bring some change being a “new entrant” in politics.

“But he sat in the lap of Congress and became the Chief Minister of Delhi in just three months of joining politics.How can you trust such a man?” Venkaiah asked.

He further referred to the Congress as the “Baap (father)” of AAP and the latter as its “Baccha (child)”.

Launching a counter-attack on Congress President Sonia Gandhi who questioned Modi on the issue of black money in her rally today, he said, “I ask her where have they kept it?”

He further said that the black money would be brought back and whosoever was guitly will be put behind bars.

Stating that Delhi’s development was very important, he emphasised that the government at the state has to work in tandem with the Central government.

The senior BJP leader also reiterated his promise to develop a smart city near Dwarka with the assistance of Spain.

BJP deploys big guns as campaign enters last lap

It was a sort of carpet bombing by BJP today as it deployed all its big guns — from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to party chief Amit Shah to a host of Union Ministers — to campaign and woo the voters for the fiercely fought February 7 assembly polls.

Modi addressed his second rally in as many days in South West Delhi’s Dwarka where he asked people to support his party while coming down hard on Aam Aadmi Party which has put up a spirited fight for the keenly watched contest.

As the high-octane campaign entered its last lap, senior Union Ministers Arun Jaitley, M Venkaiah Naidu and Ravi Shankar Prasad addressed several rallies where they primarily targeted “main rival” AAP while seeking people’s support for a “stable” government in Delhi.

Besides the rallies, Union Ministers Piyush Goyal and Nirmala Sitharaman addressed separate back-to-back press conferences where they hit out at AAP and its leader Arvind Kejriwal on a range of issues.

The BJP has been out of power in Delhi for last 16 years.

It fell five seats short of majority in the last assembly polls in 2013.

BJP leaders Prabhat Jha, Shahnawaz Hussain and Krishnapal Gujar also addressed a number of rallies seeking a clear mandate for the party.

Delhi BJP President Satish Upadhyay, party’s Chief Ministerial nominee Kiran Bedi and former AAP leader Shazia Ilmi, who joined BJP recently, also tried to woo the voters in several rallies in outer and North East Delhi.

Union Ministers Babul Supriyo and Radha Mohan Singh were also busy campaigning for the party in various localities throughout the day.

Fielding of BJP’s top guns came days after party president Amit Shah expressed unhappiness over the party’s “lacklustre” election campaign.

Sources said Shah has taken “full control” of the campaign and tasked 120 MPs including 14 Union ministers and hundreds of party workers from 13 states to campaign in Delhi.

Addressing a rally in east Delhi’s Kondli, Union Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad today said Delhi needs a chief minister like Kiran Bedi who had “towed away” former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s car.

Prasad said AAP merely pretends to care for the ‘aam aadmi’ (common man) whereas BJP-run governments had actually installed people from the grassroots as Chief Ministers in states such as Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Haryana.

“Delhi needs a strict administrator like Kiran Bedi who did not think twice before towing away then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi’s car for parking at a wrong place at Connaught Place for which she was even transferred,” he said.

“Aam Aadmi Party pretends to be for the ‘aam aadmi’ but in reality we run governments for the common man,” he said.

Prasad went on to refer to the family background of Jharkhand Chief Minister Raghubar Das and few others to drive home his point.

“In Jharkhand we have made the son of a Tata Steel labourer the Chief Minister. Das himself was a Group D staff before he became the CM.

“Same with Maharashtra CM Devendra Fadnavis who comes from a very humble background. Our Haryana CM Manohar Lal Khattar’s father and grandfather worked as labourers after arriving in Haryana from Pakistan post-partition,” Prasad said.

Speaking in support of the party’s Kondli candidate Hukum Singh, the Minister said the opposition parties were “trembling” due to a BJP wave in the capital.

“There is a BJP wave in the capital for which the opposition can be seen trembling. If we can win the country we can also win Delhi,” he said.

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