‘If you choose AAP on May 25, I won't have to go back to jail’

New Delhi: Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal during a roadshow in Delhi on Sunday said if people choose the Aam Aadmi Party on May 25, he won't have to go back to jail. Accompanied by Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, Kejriwal held a roadshow in Moti Nagar in support of the party's candidate from the New Delhi Lok Sabha seat Somnath Bharti.

He also held a roadshow in Uttam Nagar along with Mann to garner support for the party's West Delhi candidate Mahabal Mishra.

"I have to go back to jail after 20 days. If you choose jhadu (AAP's symbol broom), I won't have to go back to jail," the chief minister said at the roadshow in Moti Nagar.

The AAP national convenor is out on an interim bail till June 1. He has to surrender on June 2.

"They sent me to jail because I worked for you. The BJP does not want that the work of Delhi people is done," he said.

Kejriwal alleged that his insulin injections were stopped for 15 days inside Tihar jail.

"If I went back to jail, the BJP would stop your work, free electricity, degrade schools and shut down hospitals and Mohalla Clinics," he charged.

He also asked people to vote for Bharti and claimed that he would be available for people even at odd hours.

At the roadshow in West Delhi, he said that people are saying that God has brought him out of jail to defeat the BJP.

"There is dictatorship in the country. We have to end this dictatorship," he added. The polling for all the seven seats in Delhi will take place on May 25.

Earlier on Sunday, Kejriwal alleged that the BJP’s plan was to topple the AAP governments in the national capital and Punjab after his arrest in a money-laundering case, but it did not work out and the party became stronger in his absence.

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) became more united “after my arrest”, Kejriwal said while addressing the party MLAs following a meeting at the chief minister’s residence here. This was Kejriwal’s first meeting with the party MLAs after being released on interim bail on Friday.

The MLAs informed Kejriwal about the developments in the last month and a half.

The chief minister’s wife Sunita Kejriwal, AAP national general secretary (organisation) Sandeep Pathak, MP Sanjay Singh, ministers Gopal Rai, Saurabh Bharadwaj, Atishi, Kailash Gahlot, its Lok Sabha poll candidates in Delhi and all the MLAs were present.

Addressing his party colleagues, Kejriwal said the Supreme Court granting interim bail to him till June 1 “was no less than a miracle”.

“Due to the incidents that have happened in the last month and a half, I feel that god is trying to get us to do something. Whatever is happening, we are just instruments, god is doing everything,” he said.

Kejriwal recalled that during his meetings with Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, Bharadwaj and Atishi in Tihar Jail, he would inquire whether the entire system in Delhi is working or not.

In Kejriwal’s absence, Delhi minister Raaj Kumar Anand resigned while accusing the AAP of “being anti-Dalit”. His resignation as a minister is yet to be accepted. Anand meanwhile has joined the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and is contesting the ongoing Lok Sabha polls from the New Delhi constituency.

“My only worry was that if due to my incarceration, the work in Delhi stopped, the supply of medicines in hospitals, electricity, water got disrupted, then they (BJP) would get a chance to blame it on us and in the middle of the election, we will somehow lose the narrative. But all of you did a very good job,” the chief minister said.

He alleged that the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) plan was to topple the AAP governments in Delhi and Punjab.

“When those from the BJP used to meet me before my arrest, they used to tell me that they will get me arrested and after that, they will break our party and topple the government in Delhi.

“Then in Punjab, they will poach our MLAs by any means and take Bhagwant Mann with them. And I do not know what kind of stories they had woven and exactly the opposite happened,” he said.