Ahmedabad: Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal on Saturday launched a crowdsourcing campaign to pick the party’s chief ministerial candidate for the Gujarat elections as part of its bid to topple the BJP in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state.
The ‘Choose Your Chief Minister’ campaign is the latest push by the Delhi chief minister, who has been aggressively campaigning in the state, holding rallies and town halls and making pre-poll promises like free electricity, better education, and health facilities.
“People want change. They want relief from inflation and unemployment. These people (BJP) changed their chief minister a year ago.
First, they had Vijay Rupani. Why did they replace him with Bhupendra Patel? Does it mean something was wrong with Vijay Rupani?” Mr. Kejriwal said at a press conference.
“When Vijay Rupani was brought in, the public didn’t ask. It was decided from Delhi. In a democracy, people decide who will be the Chief Minister. You (BJP) didn’t ask in 2016 and you didn’t ask in 2021 either,” he said.
“In the Aam Aadmi Party, we don’t do that. We decide by asking the public who they want to be the Chief Minister. You remember in Punjab we asked the people who should be the Chief Minister. And as per the people’s wish, we named Bhagwant Mann,” the AAP chief said.
“The Aam Aadmi Party will form the government in Gujarat. In such a situation whoever our chief ministerial candidate will be the next chief minister of Gujarat. So today we are asking the public to tell us who should be your chief minister.” ” he said.
“For this, we are issuing the number 6357000360 to know the opinion of the public. You can send an SMS or send a WhatsApp message or send a voice message to this number.
You can also send an email to aapnocm@gmail.com. So there are four ways for the public to she has let us know about her choice,” Mr. Kejriwal said.
“This number will be functional till November 3 by 5 PM. Results will be released on November 4,” he added.
Elections to the 182-member Gujarat Legislative Assembly are due by the end of this year. However, the surveys have not yet been published.