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Journalism of Courage
NEW DELHI, November 6: Today was her day. Party workers saw a good omen for Chief Minister Sushma Swaraj in every moment of the first day in the run-up to the November 25 Assembly elections.
She had a high-powered party in the nomination centre morning and a religious gathering in the lawns of her residence in the evening. Almost the way V P Singh had dashed to the Jama Masjid after filing his nomination papers way back in 1989.
Sushma Swaraj managed to get every warring group to rally behind her 8212; be it inside the Bharatiya Janata Party or disappointed outside ally Akali Dal Badal.
When Swaraj reached the Hauz Khas nomination centre at 11.45 pm, she had all the right people lined up to give her garlands and make her nomination filing an event. Not just that, it provided the platform for a Mandan Lal Khurana and Sushma Swaraj patch-up ceremony. Khurana beamed while garlanding a jubilant Swaraj in front of teaming television and print media cameras.
She even had Akali Dal Badal Delhi unit president Avatar Singh Hit and general secretary Parmajit Singh in attendance for a show of support from outside8217;.
State and Central party bosses Venkaiah Naidu, K.L. Sharma and Vijay Malhotra put in an appearance at the nomination centre. Swaraj8217;s name was proposed by MCD members Arti Mehra and Swarup Singh and seconded by Hauz Khas mandal chief Nand Kishore and Shiv Lal. By evening her residence and lawns were decked up for belated Gurpurab celebrations. Passages from the Guru Granth Sahib were read out and all the biwigs of the Delhi Sikh community were present: members of the Akali Dal, gurdwara committees, Sikh socialites, high-brow Punjabi writers and industrialists. Lt-Governor Vijai Kapoor and his wife put in a late appearance.
Swaraj even managed to gather all 70 BJP candidates for the coming elections lined up for a photo-op at her residence giving the impression of togetherness to all present.
