Kejriwal should not have asked for surgical strikes' proof: AAP's Kumar Vishwas on recent poll losses

NEW DELHI: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has had a string of electoral defeats because, among other things, Arvind Kejriwal "shouldn't (have) attack(ed) the PM" and because his "stand on surgical strikes was wrong," said AAP's soft-spoken but high-profile leader and resident poet Kumar Vishwas, in an interview with a TV channel.

Other reasons for the party's loss are a "lack of" intra-party democracy and a "trust deficit" with voters, the prominent AAP leader said.

Kejriwal has very openly been at loggerheads with Prime Minister Narendra Modi since the former became Delhi chief minister in 2015. The Delhi CM in fact extended that hostility even to the extent of asking the Centre for "proof" that surgical strikes took place on terrorist camps in Pakistan-occupied-Kashmir last September.


AAP is in turmoil following its disastrous showing in Sunday's Delhi civic polls, which in turn came on top of exceedingly poor performances in the recent Punjab and Goa Assembly elections.

Blaming EVMs
Kejriwal and other AAP leaders have been putting the blame squarely on Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), which they say were "tampered with".

In fact, Kejriwal said a day before the Delhi civic polls, he said he feared "5 to 10 per cent" EVM tampering.

"This is not a (Narendra) Modi wave, this is an EVM wave. This is the same wave that they (BJP) used in the Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Punjab polls," AAP leader Gopal Rai said two days ago when civic poll votes were counted.

Not all party members or former party members thought EVMs were to blame.

The party's MP from Punjab, Bhagwant Mann, told TOI it is wrong to blame the machines for AAP's defeat.

"Instead of finding faults with EVMs, it is time to start finding faults in the party," he said.

Vishwas had similar views.

"We can't blame EVMs. They aren't main issue. The main issue is mistrust," Vishwas told the television channel today. "The connect with voters was missing. AAP needs to introspect," he added.

He also said there was no intra-party democracy in AAP. "Decision is taken (just) by a few people," Vishwas revealed.

Since Wednesday, when the results of the Delhi civic polls emerged, party members have quit from their posts, former party members have penned anti-Kejriwal tirades and still other party members have chastised the top leadership for not leading from the front.

A chagrined Kejriwal on Thursday called a meeting of all legislators at his residence; Vishwas said he wasn't present at that meeting. And yesterday, Punjab unit in-charge Sanjay Singh and organisation-building head Durgesh Pathak resigned from their respective posts.

Their offers to resign come on top of the resignation on Wednesday of AAP's Delhi unit chief Dilip Pandey from his post and of legislator Alka Lamba , who took responsibility for AAP's sorry defeat.

AAP came in second behind the BJP, after Wednesday's counting of Sunday's civic polls vote. It won a mere 48 of 270 seats. By comparison, the BJP won a whopping 181 seats.