AAP to kick off statewide outreach campaign in Punjab tomorrow

Announcing the mega drive on Friday, AAP’s Punjab in-charge Manish Sisodia said the Mann government had done a splendid job, delivering beyond the party’s 2022 poll promises

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) will launch a statewide door-to-door campaign on September 20 to reach every household in Punjab to showcase the Bhagwant Mann government’s report card for the past four-and-a-half years and enrol new members to strengthen its grassroots presence.

AAP state president Aman Arora and working president Amansher Singh Sherry Kalsi were also present. (HT)

Announcing the mega drive on Friday, AAP’s Punjab in-charge Manish Sisodia said the Mann government had done a splendid job, delivering beyond the party’s 2022 poll promises. He said the government has done more work than any regime in the past 75 years, and it was now the party’s responsibility to take its achievements to the people. “Our 2.68 lakh workers across booth committees cover all 25,332 polling booths in the state,” he added, claiming every family is benefiting by ₹ 15,000 on an average every month, or total ₹1.82 lakh annually, from the government’s schemes,” he said at a press conference here. AAP state president Aman Arora and working president Amansher Singh Sherry Kalsi were also present.

Mann will release its election campaign pamphlet in Ludhiana on September 19 and join the campaign in his Dhuri assembly constituency the next day.

The party has not specified the duration of the campaign.

The AAP’s announcement came on the day the BJP, which is making an unprecedented and determined bid to emerge as a political force in Punjab, launched the first of its four ‘Nasha Mukt Punjab Yatras’ from Punjab’s Pathankot. The yatras covering nearly 4,000 kilometres in all 117 assembly constituencies would culminate in a Jalandhar rally addressed by Union home minister Amit Shah on September 30.

The AAP’s strategy was finalised at its newly constituted political affairs committee (PAC) chaired by national convener Arvind Kejriwal on Thursday. Mann and finance minister Harpal Singh Cheema, who have been inducted into the party’s top decision-making group, also attended the meeting.

Sisodia also stated that people from all sections of society in Punjab were extremely happy with the government and wanted to see Mann return as chief minister. Taking a dig at the Opposition, the AAP leader alleged that the SAD-BJP’s 2007-2017 rule had pushed Punjab into drugs, while the Congress government had failed to fulfil any of its election promises. He said previous governments had pushed Punjab toward financial distress and allowed the drug problem to spread. “These issues will also be highlighted during the door-to-door campaign so that people can understand the difference between the previous governments and the work done by the Bhagwant Mann government,” the AAP leader said.

Arora, who is also a cabinet minister, said that the party gave five ‘guarantees’ before the elections, but the government had undertaken works that no one had even asked for at the time. “The government has done its job and now party workers have to step up and take it to the people,” he added.