New Delhi: With just three days left for the Delhi Assembly elections, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday challenged the BJP to announce its chief ministerial candidate by 1 pm on Wednesday and said he is ready for a public debate with the prospect.
Kejriwal said if the BJP doesn't declare its candidate by then, he will meet the press to announce his next course of action.
"Delhiites want the BJP to declare its chief ministerial candidate and I am ready for a debate with him," he said after the AAP launched its manifesto for the February 8 elections.
He said people want to know who would be the BJP's chief ministerial face, claiming people are saying why they should vote for the BJP if it does not have the CM candidate.
Kejriwal's comments on the day his party released its manifesto for the assembly polls.
The AAP chief said the BJP can decide the place for the debate, adding that in a democracy, people should have a chance to ask a question. By withholding the name of its chief ministerial candidate, senior BJP leader and Union Home Minister Amit Shah is demanding a "blank cheque" from the people of Delhi, he said.
Shah is telling people he will fill up the name of the chief minister on the cheque later, if the saffron party gets Delhi's mandate, Kejriwal said.
"In a democracy, the chief minister is chosen by people, not by Amit Shah. What if Amit Shah names some uneducated person for the CM's post, which will be a betrayal to the people of Delhi," the AAP chief said.
"I ask people everywhere that your one vote will directly go to Kejriwal. People want to know where their vote will go if they support the BJP in the election. If they don't have a chief ministerial candidate, it means people's vote for BJP will go waste," he said.
Kejriwal and the BJP have been involved in a war of words on several topics, including development in the national capital and the protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in parts of the city.
The saffron party has lashed out at Kejriwal on a number of occasions, describing him as a "terrorist". The chief minister on Monday had recited the Hanuman Chalisa as he insisted that he did not need an endorsement on Hinduism from the BJP.
Kejriwal had also hit out at the BJP over the Shaheen Bagh blockade, saying the BJP was trying to benefit from the protest.
(With inputs from PTI)
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