Delhi: Campaign coordinator for Kiran Bedi quits BJP over 'dictatorial attitude'

Just five days ahead of polling and on the day the party is scheduled to release its ‘vision document’, a campaign assistant of the BJP chief ministerial candidate Kiran Bedi quit the party, saying that he was upset over the manner in which she was treating party cadre. According to a CNN-IBN report, Narendra Tandon, who is also a member of the BJP state executive, had said he was tired of Bedi’s ‘dictatorial attitude’. [caption id=“attachment_2075063” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Reuters[/caption] The Delhi BJP meanwhile has hit back, saying that Tandon was only one of many campaign managers for Bedi, and that he resigned from the party three times in the past as well. I have resigned today. I was fed up with the dictatorial attitude of Kiran Bedi and her staff. I tried many times to convey this to the top leadership but nothing has been done," he told CNN-IBN. Bedi refused to comment on Tandon’s resignation, only saying ‘No no no no no’ in response to a question asked by a journalist. The resignation comes as a fresh blow to the BJP, which opinion polls show is already lagging behind Arvind Kejriwal and the Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi. An ABVP opinion poll said that the AAP leader had shot into the lead, following the BJP decision to project Bedi as its CM candidate. Since then the BJP has shifted to fire-fighting mode by recalibrating its strategy. According to a Firstpost report, “With only days to go for polling, the party has resorted to football-type man-to-man marking of leaders of the Aam Aadmi Party. According to party sources, each AAP candidate will be confronted with a battery of top leaders. This tactic will be vigorously implemented in constituencies dominated by Purvanchalis, Jats and Muslims, where the party is vulnerable.” The factors that led to the recalibration of strategy are: trust deficit, infighting within Delhi BJP, poor homework done by state leaders, AAP getting stronger and more popular, the failure of state BJP leaders to create an impact among voters and hardly any penetration among slum-dwellers and resettlement colonies.