Kejriwal vs Kiran Bedi – the ‘public debate’ is on!

Raghavendra M Raghavendra M folomojo staff

On Jan 20, 2015, something unthinkable happened on Arnab Goswami’s Times Now. Kiran Bedi, the fiery ex-top cop left an interview midway, leaving Arnab Goswami’s questions unanswered and a nation desperately wanting to know. Arnab was about to ask why Kiran Bedi, one of the pillars of the Aam Aadmi Party, did not take her mentor, party founder Arvind Kejriwal, into confidence before her dramatic move to bitter rivals, the BJP.

Once associates in a crusade against corruption, Kejriwal and Kiran Bedi are now pointing fingers at each other in their fight for Delhi’s top political seat.

It all began with the BJP hijacking Kiran Bedi. Immediately, Arvind Kejriwal tweeted his take on the situation:

Later, when the BJP announced Kiran Bedi as the Delhi CM candidate, Kejriwal wished her luck and invited her to a public debate:

However, Bedi did not respond on Twitter. Instead, she told news channels that she would accept the challenge, but would only debate on the floor of the House. She said, “He believes in debate and I believe in delivery”. Meanwhile, Congress leader Ajay Maken got into the act, tweeting that he, too, was ready for debate.


Over at AAP, Kejriwal’s tweets continued. He asked Bedi to unblock him on Twitter, saying he would like prefer the debate on social media.

In response, IBNLive quoted Kiran Bedi as saying, “I blocked him more than a year back when he was spreading negativity. I blocked him because he was using unparliamentary language. I do not want my followers to be subjected to such a language.” Later, on Twitter, she offered an indirect answer to Kejriwal:


BJP leader Sambit Patra had compared the Bedi-Kejriwal fight to a battle between an Iron Lady and a I-Run man. Now, however, the Twitterverse is abuzz with Bedi’s snub to Arnab Goswami on Times Now, with #IRunBedi on the top Indian trends on the micro-blogging site.