Citing U.S. Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s remark about choosing “hope over fear and unity over division”, former Finance Minister P. Chidambaram said on Sunday that people in poll-bound Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and elsewhere should take a similar vow.
In a series of tweets, the Congress leader also mentioned the election victory of Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand to assert that “progressive” values can win elections in a democracy.
“Mr. Joe Biden, Democratic candidate in the U.S. elections, said yesterday: ‘We choose hope over fear, unity over division, science over fiction and yes, truth over lies’. That’s a good vow that the people of Bihar, MP and elsewhere should take when they go to the polling booths this month,” Mr. Chidambaram tweeted.
Apart from the three-phase Assembly polls in Bihar beginning October 28, byelections will be held in as many as 56 Assembly seats across 12 States, including 28 seats in Madhya Pradesh, on November 3 and 7.
Commenting on the landslide victory of Ms. Ardern, who has been re-elected as the New Zealand Prime Minister, the former Union Minister said it gave him ‘hope’. “The election of Ms. Jacinda Ardern as Prime Minister of New Zealand gives us hope that decency and progressive values can win elections in a democracy,” he tweeted.