Kejriwal to hold road shows in Bangalore Saturday

AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal will hold road shows across Bangalore Saturday and address a rally Sunday in the city centre while campaigning for the party's Lok Sabha candidates in Karnataka where polling will take place April 17, party leaders said Friday.

"Kejriwal will also hold a road show and address the public Sunday at Chikkaballapur, from where we are fielding former police officer K. Arkeshagainst union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister M.Veerappa Moily," Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) spokesman Rohit Ranjan told IANS.

AAP Monday released its first list of candidates to contest for 13 of the 28 parliamentary constituencies in the state and will release the second list next week.

Soon after arriving from Nagpur early Saturday, Kejriwal will hold the first road show at Hebbal for AAP candidate Babu Mathew, a former registrar of the National Law School of India, contesting from Bangalore North.

"As Kejriwal is not keeping well, he will hold road shows only in 10-12 of the 28 assembly segments across the city covering all the three parliamentary constituencies (Bangalore North, Bangalore Central and Bangalore South," Ranjan said.

Besides interacting with the public for feedback, Kejriwal will hold roadside meetings to seek votes for the party's candidates.

"We are finalising the routes in consultation with the city police to ensure the public is not inconvenienced and prevent our rival parties from causing trouble to our party workers," Rajan said.

After day-long road shows across the city, Kejriwal will attend late Saturday a fund-raising dinner at a star hotel hosted by the party's well-wishers to mobilise funds at the rate of Rs.20,000 per person to meet its poll expenses.

"About 200 people, including high net worth individuals, celebrities and noted personalities from the city have been invited to interact with Kejriwal at a closed-door dinner and discuss various issues confronting the nation," Rajan said.

Touted to be the AAP's novel initiative on the lines of dinners held by political parties in countries like the US, the high-profile event is reported to be a brain-child of former Infosys director and party's Bangalore Central candidate V. Balakrishnan.

On return from a road show and public meeting at Chikkaballapur Sunday, Kejriwal will address a public meeting at Freedom Park in the city before leaving for Delhi.

As decided by the party's national executive committee, AAP is fielding Nina P. Nayak, a social worker, to contest from the prestigious Bangalore South seat against Infosys co-founder and former UIDAI chairman Nandan Nilekani (Congress) and BJP's five-time member Ananth Kumar.

Balakrishnan will face sitting BJP candidate P.C. Mohan and Youth Congress leader Rizwan Arshad.

AAP has claimed to have about 3 lakh members across Karnataka.

"Kejriwal will be visiting the state for five-six times over the next month to campaign for our candidates contesting from all the 28 seats. We are also hoping our other national leaders like Yogendra Yadav, Prashant Bhushan and Manish Sisodia will visit the state for electioneering," AAP state unit convener Pritvireddy told IANS.