Delhi BJP chief Manoj Tiwari’s conversation with AAP rebel leader Kumar Vishwas to contest the polls or at least join the campaign for BJP has turned out to be fruitful when a BJP leader suggested that Kumar Vishwas can be considered to contest from the East Delhi seat on the BJP ticket from where Aam Aadmi Party has fielded Atishi for the upcoming general elections.
Meanwhile, the Delhi unit of BJP will come out with a separate manifesto for Lok Sabha Polls that will have a special focus on local issues of the state, Manoj Tiwari mentioned on Monday.
However, statehood will not be a part of the manifesto since Kejriwal “cannot be trusted to run the national capital in its entirety”, Tiwari added.
In 2014 general elections, Vishwas has contested the Lok Sabha elections from Amethi constituency on an AAP ticket but lost the elections.
According to the sources, the Delhi BJP leadership will recommend Kumar’s name from the seat but the final decision will be taken by the central leadership. The party is expected to announce the candidates for all seven Lok Sabha seats on April 5.
“Vishwas is a sharp orator and has a connection with voters in Delhi because he has spent a lot of time campaigning for AAP candidates in the past. The East Delhi seat would suit him because he is from Uttar Pradesh and the area has a sizeable chunk of people from there,” a source in the BJP said.
Kumar Vishwas was an AAP leader till 2018, after which the differences with Arvind Kejriwal, chief minister of AAP, multiplied. Kumar Vishwas questioned the candidature of Sushil Gupta and ND Gupta over senior party leaders for the Rajya Sabha seat.
Ahead of the Lok Sabha Polls, there is still ambiguity over Congress- AAP alliance in the capital with Arvind Kejriwal claiming that Congress President Rahul Gandhi refused to forge an alliance with AAP.
Rahul Gandhi reported to the media that he was open for an alliance throughout the country when questioned about the Congress-AAP alliance in Delhi. He made the statements to the media on the sidelines where he was addressing the party’s manifesto.