AHMEDABAD: Sensing that their fight in the Gujarat Assembly elections is likely to be with the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the BJP has sent a 17-member team, including former ministers and MLAs, to Delhi to monitor the development of the national capital. The team will return after inspecting Delhi but without meeting any AAP leader.
The AAP has been campaigning in Gujarat using the development of Delhi as a model. However, there seemed to be a lack of coordination between the BJP leaders of Delhi and Gujarat. During a press conference, when Gujarat Education Minister Jitu Vaghani was asked about the Delhi visit, he said,
“The members of the Gujarat BJP have gone to Delhi to attend a workshop of the BJP media cell, not to visit schools or check the Delhi model.” On the other hand, the Twitter account of the Delhi BJP tweeted a picture of the Gujarat delegation, and wrote, “The Gujarat delegation is welcome in Delhi to see Kejriwal’s fake Delhi model.”
Meanwhile, on hearing about the Gujarat team’s visit, Delhi Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia tweeted, “We have formed a team of 5 MLAs to welcome this team from Gujarat and show them the school and mohalla clinic.
These 5 MLAs of AAP will visit Gujarat in a week to see the schools and hospitals there. I am confident that the Gujarat government will welcome them in the same way.” The two parties have been at loggerheads for some time over the Delhi development model, with Sisodia also visiting a government school at Bhavnagar in Gujarat two months ago.