The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener Arvind Kejriwal on Friday advised the newly-elected corporators of the party at Surat in Gujarat and advised them not to let the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC) to continue indulging in “corruption”.
Interacting with party leaders, volunteers and newly elected cooperators, he said show the ruling party the power of the opposition. “We first won 27 seats in Delhi as people trusted us. In 49 days of government, we provided lots of facilities and removed corruption resulting in winning 67 seats in the next election. Now, the same way you 27 (councilors) people are being watched by the people of Gujrat,” he said.
He congratulated them for winning in Surat, the strong base of the BJP that too without any resources and also praised those candidates who lost the election.
Kejriwal proceeded with his roadshow with hundreds of party supporters and common man from the Mini Bazar in Mangadh Chowk that ended at Sarthana in Surat.
During his visit, he will also meet local office- bearers of his party and the newly-elected corporators. Although the BJP has retained power by winning 93 seats in the 120-member SMC, the AAP has become the opposition party by winning the remaining 27 seats. The Congress, which had won 36 seats in 2015, could not bag even a single seat this time.
One of the main reasons for AAP’s impressive show in Surat was the support it received from Patidar Anamat Andolan Samiti (PAAS), a quota agitation body once led by Hardik Patel, who is now the working president of Gujarat Congress, political experts said.
Although the PAAS is virtually defunct, two of its prominent members – Alpesh Kathiria and Dharmik Malavia – are still active in Surat and command support of Patidar voters.
The Congress had managed to win 36 seats in Patidarr dominated areas of Surat in the last election, riding on the anti-BJP wave created by the PAAS in 2015.
In this election, those voters turned to AAP due to anti-Congress stand taken by both Kathiria and Malavia, who had openly pledged to defeat Congress in Surat after differences between them and Congress emerged over the issue of ticket distribution, the analysts said.
The AAP has made inroads into Gujarat’s politics by winning 27 seats of Surat Municipal Corporation (SMC), one of the six cities where voting was held on Sunday.
It was for the first time that the AAP had fielded its candidates in the municipal polls in Gujarat. Although the party had fielded candidates in all six cities of Gujarat, it managed to win seats in Surat alone.
