Delhi Election 2025: How Kejriwal Yamuna Water Crisis Claims Sparked Political Controversy

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convenor and former chief minister Arvind Kejriwal was, for a large part of the campaign ahead of the February 5 Delhi Assembly election, cautious and measured in his comments. In this crucial election, described as a do-or-die battle for both Kejriwal and his party, the AAP leader even appeared to play from the back foot, ready to accept that there were some unkept promises, among them, the commitment to clean the River Yamuna.

However, as the campaign got into top gear, Kejriwal went all out against the BJP over the river’s pollution. By doing so, he succeeded in forcing his rivals to respond to his allegations rather than stress on their chosen campaign themes. He has also been successful in ensuring that he is at the centre of discourse, which is significant as he is the face of his party in this election.

As the campaign entered its final leg, Kejriwal made the shocking allegation that the BJP government in neighbouring Haryana was sending poisonous water into the capital and that the saffron party wanted to carry out mass murder in the city. Matters came to a head on January 27, when Kejriwal quoted chief minister Atishi’s post on X about the high levels of ammonia in the Yamuna. The Delhi government claimed that Haryana had failed to resolve the problem of ammonia pollution in the river by not acting against the sources of pollution and not providing additional water to dilute the chemical.

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Quoting a message posted by Atishi on X, Kejriwal wrote on the social media platform in Hindi that the BJP government in Haryana is sending water to Delhi by mixing poison in it. “If Delhiites have this water, many will die. Can any act be more abhorrent than this? The poison that is being mixed in this water cannot be cleaned by any water treatment plant. To protect the people, we have had to stop water supply in many areas,” he wrote.

He added: “Our effort is to minimise the troubles to the people. The BJP people want to carry out a mass murder of the people of Delhi. We will not allow this to happen.”

Since then, all prominent campaigners of the rival parties, the BJP and the Congress, have reacted to Kejriwal’s claims in their election speeches and press conferences. The result is that in the last few days of the campaign, when the parties would have liked to emphasise upon their chosen issues, they were instead reacting to Kejriwal’s allegations over pollution of the Yamuna.

Addressing a rally, prime minister Narendra Modi said he drinks the water coming from Haryana and so do the judges and diplomats as also the poor. “How can one think that Haryana will poison the water to kill Modi?” he asked. Former Congress president Rahul Gandhi said in an election meeting that five years ago, Kejriwal had said he would bathe in the Yamuna and drink the river water. “It has been five years, and to date, Kejriwal ji has not had the water of the Yamuna,” he said.

Haryana chief minister Nayab Singh Saini released a video of himself drinking water straight from the river. However, AAP played the same video to claim that Saini had spat out the water, and Kejriwal claimed it even looked like he was about to vomit.

‘A deliberate conspiracy’

The Election Commission (EC) took strong objection to Kejriwal’s remarks and sought from him the facts on the basis of which he had made the claim that Haryana was sending poisonous water to Delhi. Kejriwal, in response, did not desist from attacking Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar, saying he was acting in a partisan manner and looking for a post-retirement job.

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In his letter to the EC, Kejriwal stood by his statement, insisting that the sequence of events leading up to his post on X establishes “there was a deliberate conspiracy on the part of the Haryana chief minister, who happens to be from BJP, to influence Delhi elections by sending highly polluted waters to Delhi.”

In his second explanation to the Commission, he wrote: “He knew very well that this would create artificial water scarcity in Delhi, whose blame would lie on AAP government in Delhi. This would have rendered almost half of Delhi without water and would have created huge public misery for almost 10 million people of Delhi who would have gone without water.”

He added: “I am also shocked that the CEC did not pass any orders directing Haryana CM to stop polluting Delhi’s waters right before elections. Rather, CEC chose to hound me.”

In the end, Kejriwal claimed victory in the matter, writing on X on January 31 that Haryana has finally stopped supplying toxic water to Delhi. “I want to congratulate the people of Delhi. Today, the struggle of the AAP’s Delhi government and 2.5 crore people of the city has delivered results,” Kejriwal said.

Political expert Rashid Kidwai said Kejriwal has set the agenda in this election, forcing others to react to him. “The BJP likes to set the agenda in an election. Regardless of what the outcome of this election will be, one thing is clear: Kejriwal has set the agenda and forced the BJP to deviate from the issues they would have liked to talk about,” he said.

With his Yamuna gambit, Kejriwal set the agenda for the final days of the election campaign in Delhi and proved that while this is his toughest political battle yet, he has succeeded in taking control of the election narrative.