Newly freed Delhi Chief Minister announces resignation

Arvind Kejriwal of the opposition AAP, who is charged with corruption and was granted bail this week, said he will leave top post

Indian opposition leader Arvind Kejriwal, who was released on bail while facing charges of corruption, has announced his intention to resign as chief minister of New Delhi’s regional government. Founder and leader of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), the 55-year-old first entered mainstream politics on the back of anti-corruption activism and has been Delhi’s chief minister since 2015.

He was granted bail last week by India’s Supreme Court after spending six months in pre-trial detention. He had been arrested in March in connection with a controversial liquor excise policy, which was scrapped by the Delhi government in 2022 due to irregularities.

Kejriwal and other members of his government were accused of allegedly selling liquor licenses and receiving kickbacks from private vendors. Prior to his release from jail, three other senior AAP leaders were granted bail in related cases. The chief minister’s bail was set at one million rupees ($11,920) with conditions that he refrain from visiting his office and from signing any official documents, and that he make no public comments about the case against him.

“Today I have come to ask the public whether you see Kejriwal as honest or a criminal… I will resign from the post of chief minister in two days and ask the people if I am honest,” the AAP leader stated on Sunday.

His tenure would have continued until February 2025. However, Kejriwal and his party also indicated they would seek early polls in the national capital in November. The AAP will begin the process of choosing a replacement for the chief minister once Kejriwal submits his resignation letter.

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According to the Hindustan Times, the decision for Kejriwal to step down was made at a meeting of senior AAP leaders at his residence on Saturday. This is not the first time Kejriwal has resigned from the top post before completing his term. The AAP formed the Delhi government with external support from the Indian National Congress, the country’s oldest party, which is now in opposition at the federal level.

Kejriwal took oath as chief minister of Delhi for the first time in 2013 but resigned after 49 tumultuous days in office. The AAP then won a landslide victory in the 2015 assembly elections, securing 67 of 70 seats, and Kejriwal was re-elected as chief minister. The AAP won again in 2020, making him chief minister for a third time.

Reacting to the political figure’s announcement, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of PM Narendra Modi stated that if the AAP leader wanted early polls, he should dissolve the Delhi Assembly.

“When Arvind Kejriwal talked about resigning, it became a confession of his crime. He accepted that the charges leveled against him were such that he could not continue as chief minister,” party spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi said on Sunday.

The BJP also labeled Kejriwal’s resignation bid as a “PR exercise and a drama” and suggested he was playing an “emotional card,” given the conditions of his bail. The party had called on Kejriwal to resign last year when he was arrested.