Parvesh Verma against Kejriwal, Ramesh Bidhuri against Atishi: BJP releases first list of candidates for Delhi Assembly polls

The Bharatiya Janata Party released its first list of candidates for the upcoming Delhi Assembly polls on Saturday. The announcement comes a day after Prime Minister Narendra Modi came down heavily on the ruling Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi.

The ruling party in the Centre has announced names of 29 candidates for the election to the 70-seat Delhi Assembly. As per the list, the party has fielded former MP Parvesh Verma against AAP leader and former Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal in the New Delhi seat. BJP has fielded another former MP, Ramesh Bidhuri, from Kalkaji, where Chief Minister Atishi is contesting.

The party has fielded former Delhi Congress president  Arvinder Singh Lovely from Gandhi Nagar and former AAP Minister Kailash Gahlot from Bijwasan. BJP’s national office-bearers Dushyant Kumar Gautam and Ashish Sood are contesting from Karol Bagh and Janakpuri, respectively. Former Delhi BJP president Satish Upadhyay will contest from Malviya Nagar.

On Friday, inaugurating several development works in the national capital, Prime Minister Modi slammed the AAP and referred to the party as "aapda”, meaning disaster. Modi said the situation in the national capital would worsen if its present regime continued. Modi also raised the slogan, "Aapda ko nahi sahenge, badal kar rahenge (we will not tolerate 'aapda', we will remove it) during the event.

Coming down heavily on Kejriwal, Modi charged, "hardcore corrupt individuals, using social activist Anna Hazare as a front, have pushed Delhi into this crisis". 

However, AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal rebutted Modi's accusations saying the “aapda” was within the saffron party, as they had not yet declared their CM candidate. He also blamed the Centre for the deteriorating law and order situation in the national capital.