Have plans in place to run government, poll campaign: AAP

NEW DELHI: While

AAP

national convener

Arvind Kejriwal

is in the

Enforcement Directorate

’s custody till March 28, party functionaries said on Saturday that this would not impact the day-to-day governance of Delhi or the campaign for the upcoming

Lok Sabha elections

.
A senior Aam Aadmi Party leader said they had anticipated Kejriwal’s arrest and the party had made arrangements and divided responsibilities among all senior leaders in case of such an eventuality.

They, however, insisted that Kejriwal would continue to remain the head of both the party and the state govt.

With the model code of conduct in operation after Lok Sabha polls were announced, the next two months would only see “routine functioning” of Delhi govt , a party leader pointed out. “We don’t have to take any big decision related to a policy or programme that requires the presence of CM,” the leader said. “In case there is an urgent matter, we can always take permission of the court to bring it to the knowledge of Arvind Kejriwal.”

The AAP functionary, however, added that if Kejriwal was forced to resign as CM, either on the intervention of the central govt or the LG or on the insistence of a court, the next course of action would then be decided. “CM must even have anticipated that situation and already decided who will take over the various responsibilities. The decision will be taken at that point of time only and all party leaders will, of course, abide by it,” the leader said.

Another AAP leader said the Lok Sabha elections were a bigger challenge but the responsibilities for managing various aspects of the polls had already been assigned, with the entire campaign — issues, meetings, rallies — to be handled by AAP’s general secretary (organisation) and Rajya Sabha member Sandeep Pathak. “What kind of issues have been raised, what will be the narrative of the campaign now and how it will change as we head closer to the poll dates in Delhi, Haryana and Punjab, will be decided by Pathak. Of course, other party leaders will also contribute and we will get regular inputs and directions from Kejriwal too,” said the leader.
While administration will be taken care of by national treasurer Pankaj Gupta, work related to Delhi will be the responsibility of state convener and minister Gopal Rai.

A party leader said, “One important aspect is the coordination with the INDIA bloc partners, especially Congress. The meetings with the Congress leaders, the panel for a joint campaign and common programmes will be decided by Pathak and ministers Atishi and Saurabh Bharadwaj. The three have been in touch with the Congress leaders since the talks on an alliance and seat-sharing began.”

While AAP is contesting four of the capital’s seven seats, Congress will be fighting for three. AAP has already announced its candidates for the South Delhi, East Delhi, West Delhi and New Delhi constituencies. Congress, which will contest the North East Delhi, North West Delhi and Chandni Chowk seats, is yet to announce its nominees for the constituencies.