AAP has the track record of bouncing back: Bharadwaj

New Delhi: AAP leader Saurabh Bharadwaj's nine-year-old daughter recently asked him a complex question and he was not sure how to respond to her. The query was related to the arrest of senior party leader Manish Sisodia in the Delhi excise policy case and the difficulties surrounding the party. Narrating the incident, Bharadwaj told PTI that even young children are not immune to the current situation in Delhi. "These are difficult times and everyone's lives around us are being impacted," he said.

The AAP national spokesperson said his daughter recently asked him whether he too would go to jail now that he was set to become a cabinet minister. Following the resignation of Sisodia and another party leader Satyendar Jain, who too is in jail in a corruption case, from the cabinet, Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has recommended the names of Bharadwaj and Atishi to Delhi Lieutenant Governor VK Saxena for inclusion in the cabinet.

"My nine-year-old daughter asked me what happened to the ministers. I told her that they resigned. She said to me they are in jail. She then told me, 'Probably you will also go to jail now that you have become a minister'," Bharadwaj said. However, he added it is a matter of great pride for him that he and Atishi have been chosen to join the Delhi Cabinet "during such challenging times". Bharadwaj alleged that there is a "witch-hunt" going on against him. "We understand that there will be attacks. Even now, I get to know from people in the government who are AAP sympathisers or locals that they are trying to find something in the Delhi Jal Board (DJB) or in my constituency against me. There is a constant witch-hunt. But that is the challenge," he said, without naming anyone. Bharadwaj has donned multiple hats for his party.

He is the party's national spokesperson and its prominent face on television debates. He is also the vice chairman of the Delhi Jal Board and the party's in-charge of a few zones of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD). Post his elevation to the cabinet, how will he handle so many responsibilities? "It is very tough for the party, it is very tough for the government because the Centre is using all its resources, all its might against the Government of Delhi. In these testing times, if the chief minister has reposed faith and trust, we have to rise up to the occasion. We will work till late in the night and then get up early and start working," Bharadwaj said.

Despite things stacked against the AAP at the moment, he said the morale of the workers is ''good''. "We have a good track record of coming back from tough situations. We have become stronger and taller after bouncing back. The cadre knows that there will be testing times," he asserted. Talking about the larger scheme of things from the current perspective, he said states are in an ''unstable situation'' currently due to the BJP-ruled Centre.

"It is a very sad and unfortunate picture... Someone sitting in Israel or another country might be thinking of investing in India, but they are seeing that the Centre is targeting state governments and family members of leaders.

Somewhere they are targeting someone's daughter or someone's nephew. They are troubling Arvind Kejriwal in Delhi and in Tamil Nadu, the governor is fighting with (M K) Stalin. In Punjab, the governor is not allowing Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann to convene the budget session," he said. "Who would invest here if they see that the leadership of the state is being troubled like this?" he asked. The AAP leader said investor summits do not bring investors. "At the end of the day, you get investors through stability and harmony which is missing from the country," he added. P