The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)'s landslide victory in Delhi is very exciting. I did not expect a victory of this scale. It is both surprising and extremely exciting. I can never forget this day. After quitting one of the IT majors in the World, Infosys, I joined the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) in January 2014. In my opinion, the AAP is the best start-up by an IITian. Today's Delhi result is extremely surprising and encouraging. It proves that there is a big space for alternative politics in India.
Just eight months ago, the AAP lost the Lok Sabha election very badly. I too lost from Bangalore Central on the AAP ticket. It is remarkable because we managed to bounce back in a never seen before manner in just eight months. In last February, Arvind Kejriwal resigned as chief minister of Delhi. After four months, we lost Lok Sabha election. Many wrote our obituary. They thought that the Modi juggernaut would continue for years to come.
The AAP led by Arvind Kejriwal has registered a very impressive victory applying a powerful brake to Modi's march. I am not repeating it because I am a member of the AAP.
The AAP is accused of promising too much and running a populist campaign. I want to assure the people of Delhi that we have a blueprint for everything. Under the AAP rule, Delhi will be a World Class city. We will develop it into an inclusive city, which has space for all sections of the society irrespective of his or her religious, social, economic and educational background. Arvind has a vision and the party will guide him and his government. Delhi will see an overall development.
In a diverse and developing country like India, we need a compassionate capitalism. We don't need either only capitalism or a left wing politics. We don't need extremes. Extremes won't work in India. We need to be inclusive in everything. Only the AAP can provide that. We believe in compassionate capitalism. Not the one which benefits only the privileged class. Capitalism must benefit all including the poor.
During the poll campaign, AAP ran a very positive campaign. We spoke about what we can do for the people. We never made it a personality driven campaign. We focused on the issues concerning the common people. Our campaign was very positive and local. We never got into mud slinging like the BJP. The BJP ran a negative campaign like they did during the last Lok Sabha election.
Finally, our positive campaign has yielded fantastic results. It clearly shows that there is a huge scope for value based politics and clean politics. Look at the scale of the victory. Is not it a proof? The magnitude of the victory is just sinking in. Both pre-poll surveys and exit polls underestimated it. Scale of victory in huge. It is really huge. There are not many parallels in the history of Indian elections.
(V Balakrishnan is a top leader of the Aam Aadmi Party. He was AAP candidate from Bangalore Central in Lok Sabha polls. An IITian, Balakrishnan was Chief Financial Officer (CFO) at IT major Infosys)
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