BARNALA: Reiterating his party’s “no alliance” resolve, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convener and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal on Sunday announced to contest all the 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab alone.The AAP leader, who launched the party’s election campaign for the Lok Sabha polls with a rally in Barnala town, attacked both ruling Congress in Punjab and opposition SAD for being “anti-people” and not fulfilling the promises made to people. He also accused them of colluding with each other to save the Lambi seat of former chief minister Parkash Singh Badal and of SAD chief Sukhbir Badal at Jalalabad.Referring to the breakaway AAP faction, Kejriwal claimed the party was still united and strong. “The broom (AAP symbol) has not broken despite the suspension of some leaders, who were sheer opportunists. The party will only emerge stronger,” he told the gathering at the rally. Barnala is part of Sangrur parliamentary constituency, a seat held by AAP leader Bhagwant Mann Kejriwal also played the Dalit card to woo them and others from weaker sections of the society. He devoted most part of his address to discuss various facilities provided to them by his government in Delhi or elevating Dalits leaders to higher posts in the party. Punjab has four parliamentary seats reserved for scheduled castes. He also promised to replicate the Delhi model of refurbishing education and health care sectors in Punjab. AAP made Dalit MLA Harpal Cheema the leader of opposition in Punjab assembly, he said. Dalit MLA Budh Ram was made chairman of core committee in Punjab, Dalit MP Sadhu Singh was member of political affairs committee.Interestingly, not once did he mention the issue of his tendering an apology to SAD leader Bikram Majithia, whom he had accused of being a drug lord.Blaming the Akali Dal for the recent incidents of sacrilege in Punjab, he said the former chief minister had to clean shoes at gurdwara for atonement of his actions. Congress, which returned to power in the state by making lofty promises to youths, farmers, Dalits and pensioners, has not taken very long to forget about them, he added.Slamming the Congress government’s move to bring in private players in education and health care services, the AAP convener said his government had managed to improve their working immensely and even improved the pass percentage in government schools to 90%, from less than 40% earlier. Every type of treatment, tests are free of cost in government hospitals, he said.Earlier, Mann spoke about his efforts to raise the issues on parliament. “The first-time MPs fail to speak in parliament, but I tried to do so despite facing lots of hardships for about a month. Besides, I raised every issue (in the House) despite getting very less time,” he said and assured to keep raising people-centric issues if re-elected to the parliament.

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