Delhi: AAP political affairs committee meeting in evening

AAP leaders go into huddle to pick new Delhi CM, political affairs committee meeting in evening

New Delhi: The AAP has scheduled a series of meetings, including that of its political affairs committee, on Monday evening to decide on a new chief minister for Delhi, a day after Arvind Kejriwal’s surprise announcement of quitting the post.

Senior AAP leader and former deputy chief minister Manish Sisodia reached Kejriwal’s official residence to discuss with him the names of probables for the chief minister’s post, AAP leaders said.

The AAP’s Political Affairs Committee meeting is scheduled to be held at the Delhi chief minister’s residence later in the evening.

Delhi ministers Atishi, Gopal Rai, Saurabh Bharadwaj, Kailash Gahlot, some MLAs from the reserved category, including Deputy Speaker of Delhi Assembly Rakhi Birla, as well as the AAP supremo’s wife Sunita Kejriwal, were making the rounds as probables for the post.

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Addressing AAP workers at party headquarters on Sunday, Kejriwal announced to step down as chief minister amid corruption allegations against him and vowed not to return to the post till he got a “certificate of honesty” from the people.

The AAP supremo said he would become chief minister and Manish Sisodia deputy CM “only when people say we are honest”.

Kejriwal, who was released on bail from the Tihar Jail in the excise policy graft case on Friday, has said that he would hold a meeting of AAP MLAs in a couple of days and one of his party colleagues would take over as chief minister.

Alleging the BJP tried to prove him corrupt, Kejriwal claimed the saffron party could not provide good schools and free electricity to people because they were corrupt. “We are honest,” he asserted.

“They slap false cases against non-BJP chief ministers. If the CMs are arrested, I urge them not to resign but run their government from jail,” Kejriwal said on Sunday.

“I didn’t resign (after arrest in excise policy case) because I respect democracy and the Constitution is supreme for me,” he had said and asserted that it was only the AAP that could stand up to the BJP’s “conspiracies”.