NEW DELHI — One of India’s main opposition figures and New Delhi’s chief minister said he would resign from office Sunday, two days after he was granted bail in a bribery case.
Arvind Kejriwal, a fierce critic of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, was arrested nearly six months ago ahead of national elections on charges of receiving bribes from a liquor distributor. India’s top court released him on bail Friday.
Kejriwal has consistently denied the accusations and called them a political conspiracy.
“Today I have come to ask the public whether you consider Kejriwal honest or a criminal,” he said in a public address Sunday at the headquarters of his Aam Aadmi Party, which governs New Delhi. “I will resign from the post of chief minister two days from today.”
Kejriwal said his party — a part of a broad alliance of opposition parties called INDIA and was the main challenger to Modi’s Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party in June’s elections — will hold a meeting later to decide who will take over his position.
He also demanded the New Delhi elections, scheduled for February next year, be held in November instead.
Opposition parties widely condemned Kejriwal’s arrest. They accused Modi’s government of misusing federal investigation agencies to harass and weaken its political opponents. They pointed to several raids, arrests, and corruption investigations of key opposition figures in the months before the elections.
Kejriwal’s supporters celebrated his release by lighting firecrackers and dancing in the rain outside his New Delhi residence, with many carrying placards with photos of the popular politician.
Some leaders from Modi’s party warned that he was released on bail and not acquitted.
Government agencies have accused Kejriwal’s party and ministers of accepting 1 billion rupees or $12 million in bribes from a liquor distributor nearly two years ago in return for revising a liquor sales policy in New Delhi, allowing private companies greater profits.
Kejriwal, a former civil servant, launched the Aam Aadmi Party in 2012. He promised to rid the Indian political system and governance of corruption and inefficiency.
The party’s symbol — a broom — and its promise to sweep the administration of graft struck a chord with New Delhi’s residents, fed up with runaway inflation and slow economic growth.
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