Modi launches battle for Delhi

Says 'anarchists' should join Naxals in jungles; Kejriwal claims personal attacks proof that BJP is rattled

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday urged the people of Delhi not to vote for “anarchists” who, he said, should join Naxalites in jungles. Launching the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)’s campaign for the Delhi Assembly elections, scheduled for mid-February, Modi told the capital’s populace to “punish” those who had wasted a year, those who were “masters at lying”.

Though the prime minister didn’t mention Arvind Kejriwal or his Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) by name, his words bore unmistakable references to the AAP leader who, in January last year, had claimed he was an anarchist. While Modi was somewhat oblique during his 50-minute speech at the Ramlila Ground, party president Amit Shah was more forthright in his attack. Shah accused the AAP of holding a “record of telling lies”.

Modi told the gathering Shah was “the most successful BJP president ever”.

Later in the day, Modi’s and Shah’s attacks drew responses from Kejriwal and other AAP leaders. The former Delhi chief minister said the BJP leadership lacked a “positive agenda” and the “personal attack” on him was proof that the BJP was rattled. He also punched holes in some of Modi’s promises pertaining to power and water supply.

Modi seemed to acknowledge the challenge posed by the AAP, as he reached out to the Kejriwal-headed party’s base of middle-class and poor voters with a slew of promises. He said all slum dwellers in the capital would have pukka houses by 2022; there would be 24-hour water supply, as his government would strive to “silence” the sound of diesel generators in Delhi and reduce the resultant pollution; the city’s water woes would be resolved with help from the BJP government in Haryana; the poor would be given two LED bulbs each, free of cost, to help reduce their power bills; and power consumers in Delhi could soon choose their supplier.

The prime minister highlighted how the Jan Dhan Yojana had empowered the poor, with 110 million bank accounts opened by January 10 and Rs 8,500 crore of deposits, against the target of 70 million accounts by January 26. He said 1,900,000 accounts were opened in Delhi alone.

In yet another reference to the AAP, Modi said some people had “mastered” protests and demonstrations on the footpath. “Let them continue to do that. We have mastery over providing good governance. Elect us to give a good government to Delhi.” He dismissed rumours that a BJP government in Delhi had plans to lower the retirement age of government employees to 58 years. The days when the poor could be hoodwinked by abusing three-four rich people were history, he said. Corruption faced by the common folk, as well as extortion of auto-rickshaw drivers, a core base of the AAP, would be done away with, the prime minister promised.     

That the BJP had made enormous efforts to make the rally a success was evident, with the party’s seven members of Parliament from Delhi, as well as recently elected chief ministers Devendra Fadnavis (Maharashtra), Manohar Lal Khattar (Haryana) and Raghubar Das (Jharkhand) present on the stage. Amit Shah, along with senior ministers Nitin Gadkari and M Venkaiah Naidu, were also present.

While Urban Development Minister Naidu said the government had passed laws to legalise unauthorised colonies, Shah said unaccounted money stashed abroad would be brought back soon, once the legal complications were resolved.

Though a quarter of the chairs at Ramlila Ground, the size of two football fields, couldn’t be filled, hundreds of enthusiastic young men at the fore of the crowd continuously chanted Modi’s name.

Delhi has been under President’s Rule since the 49-day AAP government quit in mid-February 2014. With the BJP yet to announce its chief ministerial candidate, the Delhi Assembly elections promise to be part two of the Modi-versus-Kejriwal battle, the first having been fought for the Varanasi Lok Sabha seat in May last year.