NEW DELHI: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Kumar Vishwas Saturday said the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had offered him the Delhi chief minister’s post provided he engineered the defection of AAP legislators.
Vishwas said he was told that he has to bring along 12 AAP lawmakers were willing to cross over.
“A BJP MLA (member of legislative assembly) who is also an old friend had come to my house after (general) elections. I thought he had come to either congratulate or sympathise as I had lost the election. But he told me that his party wanted me to accept the post of chief minister. He also told me he was meeting me at the behest of the BJP leadership,” Vishwas said.
Vishwas had unsuccessfully contested general elections from Amethi constituency in Uttar Pradesh and finished third behind the Congress party vice-president Rahul Gandhi and now federal minister Smriti Irani.
Vishwas said he turned down the offer and informed his party colleagues. The poet-turned-politician refused to reveal the identity of the BJP lawmaker. Delhi is under President’s rule since February 14 after AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal resigned as minister after being in power for 49 days.
Many believe Kejriwal quit to focus on the Lok Sabha elections as he did not want to remain grounded in Delhi. However, after a disastrous debut, in which the party could win merely four seats — all from Punjab — the AAP is back to prepare for the Delhi elections.
The party has already moved to the Supreme Court seeking fresh election as the BJP-led federal government is not keen on ordering elections soon. Delhi can remain under President’s rule until February next year and fresh polls can be held only after the Lieutenant Governor informs the federal home ministry that no party or group are in a position to form the government.
Although the BJP won all seven Lok Sabha seats of Delhi in the general elections, the party is in mood to go in for fresh polls before assembly elections are completed in Haryana, Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Jammu and Kashmir, which will test popularity of the Narendra Modi government.
A section of the BJP leadership in Delhi tried to form the government after its victory in general elections allegedly with the help of Congress party MLAs. The move was dropped as the central leadership of the party felt forming government through manipulations would give the party a bad name.
The BJP had emerged the single largest party with 31 seats in the 70-member Delhi assembly last December while the AAP bagged 28. The Congress that ruled Delhi for 15 years finished third with just eight seats and opted to extend its outside support to the AAP.
With three MLAs elected to the Lok Sabha, the BJP now has 28 MLAs while the AAP’s strength reduced to 27 following expulsion of an MLA. The assembly is currently kept under suspended animation.
Vishwas’ revelation has met with criticism. Delhi BJP president Satish Upadhyay challenged him to name the MLA in question, and the date and timing of the alleged meeting, while the Delhi Congress spokesman Mukesh Sharma termed it as another lie from AAP.
“AAP is known for conducting stings of any such meeting. Let them come out with the video of the alleged meeting,” Sharma said.
