JOIN USDelhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal may campaign for the Janata Dal (United) in the upcoming Bihar Assembly polls later this year.
The bonding between the two chief ministers — reflected recently in Kejriwal seeking the help of Nitish Kumar for getting competent Bihar cadre officers to strengthen Delhi anti-corruption bureau – is also impregnated with their objective of seeing a defeat for Modi and the BJP in the state to realise their individual future plans.
AAP sources said their leader Kejriwal is not averse to campaigning for Nitish, who also enjoys a clean and development oriented image like him. An AAP leader said Kejriwal has mass appeal among Biharis as well since a sizeable number of them had voted to bring him back to power in Delhi in February. In this electoral strategy, AAP leaders are looking for a window to sell brand Kejriwal in the highly caste driven political state.
The AAP top leadership, however, is not keen to contest elections in Bihar given Kejriwal’s stated position to strengthen their presence in the national capital first before venturing to other states.
If Kejriwal agrees, this would be the first time that the AAP would step out to help other parties since it emerged from the anti-corruption movement of Anna Hazare.
With the JD-U and the RJD forming an alliance and Congress showing interest to come on board, Bihar would witness a direct contest between them and the NDA.
“The rise of BJP-led NDA has forced the RJD and JD-U to come together. They are also clinging to each other like a drowning man clutches to a twig. They will not be able to defeat a rising BJP in the state. Their coming together has scared the people of Bihar once again, who after being scared of the 'Jungle Raj' under Lalu Prasad had voted for Nitish Kumar earlier,” BJP spokesperson Shahnawaz Hussain said.
With Nitish being declared as the face of the JD-U-RJD alliance, the BJP will now have to project a CM candidate to avoid Nitish-Modi contest in the state.