In 48-hours after the Aam Aadmi Party leader Arvind Kejriwal tweeted appealing for “clean money” for election campaign in Amethi and Varanasi, the party’s coffers swelled by over Rs.1 crore. On Wednesday the party received Rs. 80 lakh and on Thursday it received Rs. 35 lakh.
Of the Rs. 80 lakh, about Rs. 16 lakh was donated by people of Uttar Pradesh specifically for campaigning in Amethi and Varanasi.
On Tuesday, Mr. Kejriwal tweeted, “Reached Varanasi. Will go to Amethi on 20th. Need clean money to fight Modi and Rahul. Pl sms me if u wish to donate.” The tweet was retweeted by his over 2,000 followers within few hours.
In India, most of the donors were from Delhi, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan. The AAP also got generous donation from party supporters across the globe including those from Singapore, the U.S. Belgium, Oman, Canada, Japan, Germany and Australia.
The Kejriwal-led party has been facing financial crunch in the Lok Sabha elections. After its fund raising drive for the general election failed to pick up, the party also asked its candidates to spend their own money on the campaign, which is contrary to what the party did during the Delhi Assembly polls.
During the Assembly polls, the AAP had managed to raise over Rs. 20 crore to meet the election expenditure but till date it has managed to mobilise only Rs. 28,15,07,222 by 93,460 donors, from 114 countries, 28 States in the country.
This article has been corrected for a factual error.
