Describing Karnataka as the State on which the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) pins “very special hopes”, member of the party’s national executive Yogendra Yadav said volunteers from Bangalore top in both membership drive and monetary contributions.
Mr. Yadav told presspersons here on Thursday that 30,000 new members from Karnataka had registered online with the party in nine days and Bangalore also topped the list of monetary contributions right now, ahead of even Delhi.
There was an “outpouring of energy” during the India Against Corruption campaign in Karnataka, especially in Bangalore, and the “cosmopolitan character and political sophistication” here provided ground for “politics of virtue”, Mr. Yadav said.
Voting patternAsked if non-existence of an anti-incumbency wave in Karnataka, in contrast with Delhi, would make the going tough for the AAP here, Mr. Yadav said the voter in Karnataka was historically “sophisticated and discriminating” while voting in the Lok Sabha and the Assembly elections.
“It will be not a mere repetition of the voting pattern in the Assembly elections in Karnataka,” he said. The AAP sees itself not as a party that works on anti-incumbency but on anti-establishment sentiments of the people who were “sick, angry and tired of the political establishments” and were looming “not for a substitute, but an alternative”, he added.
Studying KarnatakaThe AAP is currently in the process of studying its strengths and weaknesses in various Lok Sabha constituencies of Karnataka and would soon state its priorities here. “We will formulate regional strategies and decide on the number of constituencies in which we will field candidates in States after we formulate the national strategy,” he said.
