Addressing party workers after his release from Tihar jail, Kejriwal said he will return to power only after being re-elected by the people in the upcoming Delhi elections.
The Delhi Chief Minister said, “I am going to resign from the post of Chief Minister after two days. I will not sit on the Chief Minister’s chair. Elections are going to be held in Delhi in a few months and I want to appeal to the people. If you think Kejriwal is honest then vote for me.”
He said, “If you think Kejriwal is guilty, then don’t vote for me. Your every vote will be a certificate of my honesty. If you vote for me and declare that Kejriwal is honest, only then will I sit on the CM’s chair after the elections. Until then I will not sit on the CM’s chair. I want to give Agnipariksha (fire test) after coming out of jail.”
Kejriwal was released from Tihar Jail after getting bail on Friday evening. Supreme Court In a corruption case related to the alleged Delhi Excise Policy scam.
The Delhi chief minister said the BJP cannot provide good schools and free electricity to people because they are corrupt. “We are honest,” he said.
The Delhi Chief Minister said, “They register false cases against non-BJP Chief Ministers. If they are arrested, I urge them not to resign but run the government from jail.”
“I did not resign (after my arrest in the excise policy case) because I respect democracy and for me the Constitution is supreme,” Kejriwal said, adding that only the AAP can counter the “conspiracies” of the BJP.
During his speech, Kejriwal drew parallels between his recent experiences in jail and those of freedom fighter Bhagat Singh. He spoke about how he wrote a letter from jail, similar to Bhagat Singh’s, but faced hurdles in communicating with the outside world.
Kejriwal recalled his time spent in Tihar jail, saying, “95 years after Bhagat Singh’s martyrdom, a revolutionary chief minister went to jail in independent India.” He explained how he wrote a letter from jail, which was similar to Bhagat Singh’s habit of communicating with comrades. He said, “Bhagat Singh’s letters reached his friends, but my letter to the LG on August 15 did not reach him. Instead, I got a warning that if I tried to write the letter again, I would be barred from meeting my family.”
Kejriwal said, “When I was in jail, one day Sandeep Pathak came to meet me. We discussed politics, but after that he was blacklisted and was not allowed to meet me again.”
BJP calls Kejriwal’s resignation a ‘PR stunt’
The BJP was quick to react to Kejriwal’s announcement, with spokesperson Pradeep Bhandari calling it a “PR stunt” aimed at improving his image.
Bhandari suggested that Kejriwal wanted to implement the Sonia Gandhi model, where she made Manmohan Singh a dummy prime minister and ran the government from behind the scenes.
“This is a PR stunt by Arvind Kejriwal. He has realized that his image among the people of Delhi is not of an honest leader but of a corrupt leader, today Aam Aadmi Party Bhandari said, “Across the country, Aam Aadmi Party is known as a corrupt party. Through their PR stunt, they want to rebuild their image… It is clear that they want to implement the Sonia Gandhi model, where they made Manmohan Singh a dummy prime minister and ran the government from behind the scenes. They have understood today that Aam Aadmi Party is losing the Delhi elections and people of Delhi cannot vote in their name, so they want to make someone else a scapegoat.”
BJP leader Manjinder Singh Sirsa alleged that Kejriwal was not sacrificing anything and was being forced to resign because of the Supreme Court order. Sirsa further claimed that Kejriwal had asked for two days to convince all the MLAs to make his wife the Chief Minister of Delhi.
“Arvind Kejriwal has announced that he will resign after two days and will become CM again when the people’s verdict comes… This is not a resignation, the Supreme Court has said in the order that he cannot go near the CM’s chair and sign any file. So, you have no choice, you are forced to resign because of the Supreme Court order. The people gave their verdict 3 months ago when you asked ‘jail or bail’, you lost all 7 (Delhi’s Lok Sabha seats) and you were sent to jail… Now he has asked for two days time because he is convincing all the MLAs to make his wife the CM… He was forced to leave his chair because he is involved in this. Alcohol scandalSirsa said.
Congress called it a ‘drama’
Congress leader Sandeep Dixit, reacting to the resignation of Delhi Chief Minister, termed it a “drama” and said that this is the first time that an elected leader, out of jail on bail, has been asked by the Supreme Court not to visit the CMO or sign any papers.
Dikshit told ANI, “There is no question of him becoming CM again. We have been saying for a long time that he should resign from the CM post… This is just a drama. This is the first time that an elected leader came out of jail on bail and the Supreme Court asked him not to visit the CMO or sign any papers… Such conditions have never been imposed on any other CM… Maybe the Supreme Court is also afraid that this person may try to tamper with evidence… The Supreme Court is treating him like a criminal… There is no connection between morality and Arvind Kejriwal.”
(with inputs from agencies)
