Sisodia to start Delhi padyatra on August 16

New Delhi
Former deputy chief minister of Delhi Manish Sisodia will start his padyatra (foot march outreach) in Delhi on August 16, instead of August 14, as the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) decided to postpone the event given security issues in the run-up to Independence Day.
As scheduled, Sisodia will start the march from DDA Flats in Kalkaji, under the Greater Kailash assembly constituency, at 5pm on Friday.
“Today, Manish Sisodia’s first padyatra was to start from the Greater Kailash assembly constituency. When permission was sought from the police department, the police department suggested because it is the atmosphere of 15th August and given the security and vigilance… it will be better to start it in two to four days from the security point of view. This advice from the police also seemed reasonable to us,” AAP’s Saurabh Bharadwaj said.
The march is part of a series of outreach programmes planned by the AAP in the run-up to next year’s state assembly elections, which are likely in February 2025.
The party also noted that August 16 is the birthday of chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and said that although they did not plan it to coincide with the day, it was an auspicious sign. “It was not our intention, it may be the design of God. It is more auspicious that the march is starting on the birthday of CM, it is a good indication for the AAP,” Bharadwaj said.
Sisodia was released from jail on August 9 after over 17 months of incarceration in connection with the now-scrapped excise policy of 2021-22. Sisodia will take public feedback during the march to chart out the strategy for polls, party members said.
An AAP member said the party has decided to start the event in the evening as people are expected to be home in the run-up to the weekend. However, there is no particular reason for choosing Kalkaji, the member said.
“We do not want any kind of problem or trouble to arise on the occasion of Independence Day. That is why, accepting the suggestion of the police, the party has decided that now Manish Sisodia’s padyatra will start from the Greater Kailash assembly constituency on August 16,” Bharadwaj said.
“Due to the conspiracies of the central government, Manish Sisodia remained in jail for 17 months. The party decided that he will undertake a padyatra… It will continue for long and cover all areas of the city,” Bharadwaj said.
Hitting out at the AAP, the president of the Delhi unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), Virendra Sachdeva, said the people of Delhi do not trust Arvind Kejriwal’s government and will send Kejriwal and Sisodia back to Ghaziabad, from where they started the dirty politics of misleading the people.
“Manish Sisodia should call his campaign Pashchatap Yatra (repentance march) rather than padyatra,” Sachdeva said.