Kejriwal keen to campaign against Modi in Varanasi, awaits Congress nod

Deeply resentful following his arrest in the Delhi liquor policy case, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) supremo Arvind Kejriwal is waiting anxiously to jump into campaign against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in Varanasi, says sources.

The Delhi Chief Minister is currently out on interim bail granted by Supreme Court to let him campaign in the polls until June 1, when the final phase will be completed. Significantly, Kejriwal had contested the 2014 Lok Sabha polls in Varanasi against Modi and had come second with over two lakh votes.

Modi is contesting from the ancient city for the third time in a row and is now mainly being challenged by UP Congress chief Ajay Rai though there are five other candidates, besides Modi and Rai, for the June 1 polls in Varanasi.

Wait for Congress nod

Sources say Kejriwal has sought the Congress’s nod to vigorously campaign against Modi, but the Grand Old Party is yet to decide.

Asked about this, an AAP functionary said in Delhi on Tuesday, “The Varanasi Lok Sabha seat is being contested by the Congress on behalf of the INDIA coalition. So, the Congress has to decide about who all are needed for campaign in the constituency. AAP will go by what the Congress finds to be necessary to take on Modi in his constituency. AAP is an active partner in the INDIA bloc and, thus, will do not do just its bit but a lot more for the success of the coalition in the polls.”

Kejriwal on campaign trail

On May 16, Kejriwal, along with AAP Rajya Sabha member Sanjay Singh, had visited Lucknow and addressed a joint Press conference together with Samajwadi Party (SP) leader and former UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav.

A day before this, the Delhi CM had held roadshows in North-East Delhi and North-West Delhi in support of Congress candidates Kanhaiya Kumar and Udit Raj respectively.

Kejriwal also visited Jamshedpur on May 21 and addressed a Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) rally along with Jharkhand Chief Minister Champai Soren. Former Chief Minister Hemant Soren’s wife Kalpana Soren, too, was present on the dais. Hemant Soren is currently in judicial custody.

AAP vs BJP

The arrest of Kejriwal in the Delhi excise policy case and the events following his release on short-term bail indicate that the battle between the AAP and the BJP is going to escalate further. Now, only two phases of polls are left and signs of a fierce showdown between the two are becoming palpable.

In the next phase, that is the sixth of the seven-phase polls, seven constituencies of Delhi are to go to polls on May 25. After this, Kejriwal can, according to AAP sources, focus on Varanasi alongside Punjab, which too is billed to vote in the last phase on June 1.

Opposition’s aim

In 2014, Modi had handsomely won the Varanasi seat, scoring over 50 per cent votes against Kejriwal. But the mandate had split in many ways, among the AAP, the Congress, and a host of other candidates as all national as well as regional parties were in the fray in Varanasi in 2014. Despite that, Kejriwal had managed to come second with over two lakh votes.

This time, Modi and Rai are the main contenders though a Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) candidate, Athar Jamal Lari, has also joined the contest. The battle is now mainly between the NDA and the INDIA bloc of parties where the BSP candidate may not have a chance to catch the voters’ fancy as much as BJP and Congress. BSP supremo Mayawati herself remarked after casting her vote in the fifth phase in Lucknow on May 20 that this time parivartan (change) appeared to be the mood of the people since they have mostly been silent.

But Modi wants the “silence” to be broken. He campaigned in Varanasi on Tuesday (May 21), exhorting women to beat thalis (plates) on the polling day to call other women voters out and encourage them to cast their vote. This is so when his victory is being taken as a foregone conclusion. What he wishes perhaps is to maintain, if not enhance, his huge victory margin whereas the Opposition or INDIA-backed Congress, would like this to be reduced. He had got over 60 per cent votes in the 2019 polls in Varanasi which may be hard to dream by any of his rivals.

What Kejriwal wants

Yet, Kejriwal, by jumping on the campaign bandwagon in the holy town, may try to change the mood in the constituency. Over the years, he has donned the image of a messiah who could revive civic economy in the case of Delhi where power is not cut even during peak periods of demand, and power and water tariffs are stable and even free up to a certain level for households with low consumption. Besides this, government schools and hospitals have improved during his reign in Delhi.

These are no mean achievements and that is how Kejriwal not only continues to be in power in Delhi despite the growing animosity between him and the Centre, but his party could also form the government in Punjab. He always claims that the BJP gets jittery because of his model of revival of Delhi’s civic system. And with the onset of elections, his allegation is that he was put in jail so as to remove him from the campaign trail.

But since the top court has willed otherwise, he is out on a relentless drive to hurt the BJP as much as he can, and Varanasi is the key point that he is now eyeing to make as much dent to the BJP vote base as possible, say sources. The ball is now, however, in the Congress’s court.