AAP announces that Atishi will be new CM of Delhi after Kejriwal’s resignation

Atishi Marlena will be the new Chief Minister of Delhi after the resignation of incumbent CM and AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal.

The party announced that its MLAs unanimously Kejriwal’s proposal forwarding Atishi’s name in a party meeting at his residence today. The education minister was subsequently elected as the leader of the Delhi AAP legislative party. 

Atishi initially served as an advisor to former Delhi education minister Manish Sisodia before wading into electoral politics in 2019. She then lost to the BJP’s Gautam Gambhir but won from Kalkaji constituency in the 2020 Delhi assembly polls. 

In March last year, She was inducted into the Delhi cabinet to take charge of multiple portfolios, including education, the public works department, power, and tourism, after Sisodia and Satyendar Jain resigned following their arrest in the liquor policy case. The AAP leader, an alumni of University of Oxford, is known for her environmental advocacy and the educational reforms introduced by her.  

The political shift came after Kejriwal shocked many by announcing that he would soon resign from his post and demanded that the Delhi assembly polls, scheduled for next year, be held along with Maharashtra polls later this year. 

Kejriwal was recently released on conditional bail in the liquor policy case that restricted his powers. He has now tried to claim the moral high ground, saying that he will not sit in the CM’s chair “until the public gives its verdict that Kejriwal is honest”. He has stopped short of dissolving his government so far though, saying that the AAP legislature party will now pick a new leader, triggering speculation about who will be the new chief minister.

What did the papers say about the Kejriwal shocker? Read here.