With panchayat polls in the offing, Kejriwal to visit Haryana today

The Hisar visit of AAP’s national convener comes ahead of the Panchayati Raj Institution (PRI) polls and a bypoll in the Adampur assembly segment, where the AAP will be fielding its candidate

Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s two-day visit to Hisar, which begins on Wednesday, is part of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP’s) determined bid to emerge as a strong alternative in Haryana.

The Hisar visit of AAP’s national convener comes ahead of the Panchayati Raj Institution (PRI) polls – panchayat polls, to be followed by Zila Parishad, and a bypoll in the Adampur assembly segment, where the AAP will be fielding its candidate.

Kejriwal will kick-off his two-day tour by launching AAP’s ‘Make India No 1’ campaign, for which invitations have been extended to students, businessmen, and other organisations. The Delhi CM, accompanied by his Punjab counterpart Bhagwant Mann will interact with the public, and will also carry out a rally in the Adampur assembly segment on Thursday, Haryana’s AAP in-charge and Rajya Sabha member Sushil Gupta said.

Haryana is the first state where ‘Make India No 1’ campaign is being launched after the programme was started in Delhi, Gupta said. Kejriwal’s visit clearly aims at launching not only the panchayat poll campaign but also preparing the AAP for the Adampur bypoll, which is expected to be held along with the elections due in some states later this year.

Behind the optimism in the rank and file of AAP regarding the panchayat polls is the experience AAP gained when it contested the civic body polls in June on the party symbol.

AAP had jumped into the civic body electoral battlefield in June to test its popularity. However, the AAP failed to cause any hiccup in the victory march of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, despite Kejriwal campaigning in the state and whipping up anti-incumbency sentiments. The party had only managed to gain a toehold of sorts by winning one seat of president in the municipal committee of Kurukshetra district from where Kejriwal had launched AAP’s campaign for elections to 18 municipal councils and 28 municipalities.

However, the AAP candidates had given a tough fight in many seats as the party nominees had lost by thin margins and the party had also made some impact in the NCR districts. It is this outcome of civic body polls held in June which has given a ray of hope for the AAP to make inroads in Haryana at grassroots level.