The Aam Aadmi Party saw a huge spike in funding on the day former IPS officer Kiran Bedi joined rival Bharatiya Janata Party. January 15 recorded the maximum donations received in a single day since the AAP launched its fund-raising initiative, #IFundHonestParty Challenge.
Since January 2, the AAP received Rs. 4.25 crore in online donations, of which Rs. 2.25 crore was donated in the week ending Sunday. Interestingly, the party received over Rs. 64 lakh on January 15, while the day before it was just Rs 31.74 lakh. As per the data provided on the AAP website, the very next day of Ms. Bedi joining the BJP, the donations again fell by more than half to Rs. 30.45 lakh on January 16. The previous best in terms of donations received in a single day since the start of the fund raising initiative was Rs 47. 34 lakh on January 13.
However, the party is well below its target of Rs. 30 crore it needs to contest the polls this time round.
With three weeks to go for Delhi Assembly elections, the party has received just over a quarter of the Rs.30 crore.
As of Sunday evening, the party had received Rs. 7.51 crore from 23,150 donors in 56 countries since November 1, 2014.
Unlike the previous Assembly election – when the party had to request people to stop contributing donations after they received the stipulated Rs. 20 crore for poll expenditure, the party is finding it difficult to meet the election expenditure this time round.
The party launched a fund-raising initiative, #IFundHonestParty Challenge, on January 2, besides hosting fund-raising lunch both in the country and abroad.
AAP National Secretary Pankaj Gupta said the week starting January 12 saw the challenge get a huge fillip as one of the donors agreed to the matching donation pledge.
“This enthused donors significantly and we have seen much higher average donation per person as each donor tried to take maximum benefit of doubling the donation impact” said Mr. Gupta.
He added that a total of 584 people accepted the matching donation challenge and gave over Rs. 26 lakh.
