Municipal polls: Aam Aadmi Party election campaign gains momentum

Ravi S Singh

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New Delhi, June 13

Undeterred by the setback due to Enforcement Directorate’s (ED) arrest of Delhi’s Minister and its senior leader Satyendra Jain in a money-laundering case, the AAP has doubled down on its campaign for the forthcoming municipal elections in Haryana. However, party national convener Arvind Kejriwal is tipped to skip the campaign.

The party has released a list of 59 star campaigners for elections to 46 municipal committees and municipal councils to be held on June 19. The AAP is contesting in 45 municipal bodies.

The names figuring on the list of star campaigners include Rajya Sabha MPs Sanjay Singh, Sushil Gupta and Raghav Chadha, and former Haryana Minister Nirmal Singh, and Ashok Tanwar.

Kejriwal’s likely skipping the campaign was part of a political strategy to keep him away from local politics. The Delhi CM, however, addressed a state-level rally in Kurukshetra recently to give momentum to the party’s electoral campaign.

A senior AAP leader said  the action against Jain was politically motivated, which was aimed to thwart the party’s campaign to expand itself. He said the party has expanded its footprints in villages in Haryana. It would use the municipal elections to expand its base in urban pockets.

AAP’s election issues will be primarily corruption in the functioning of these local bodies, and lack of civic amenities and invoking the “Delhi Model” of governance, including good schools, hospitals, etc.