AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal said his party’s students’ wing, ASAP, will ‘change the definition of politics’. 
| Photo Credit: SUSHIL KUMAR VERMA

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) national convener Arvind Kejriwal on Tuesday announced the launch of Association of Students for Alternative Politics (ASAP), the party’s students’ wing that was earlier named Chhatra Yuva Sangharsh Samiti, at the Constitution Club of India.

Addressing a gathering of nearly 200 people in his first public event outside the party headquarters since AAP’s Delhi Assembly election defeat, Mr. Kejriwal took aim at the corruption-riddled “mainstream politics” and its key players, including “the BJP and Congress”, and offered “alternative politics” that focuses on corruption-free governance, education, health care, and public welfare.

“The root cause of all problems today is mainstream politics of the kind practised by the BJP, Congress and others over the past 75 years,” he said while attacking these parties for “doing Hindu-Muslim politics” instead of addressing issues such as food, education and employment. He also took on the Delhi government for “ruining the education system” and “deploying bouncers outside schools”.

“The alternative politics [of AAP] means saving every rupee of public money, using it for the public good, and running the government honestly,” said the former CM. He added that ASAP will help bring together students who will “change the definition of politics” by challenging the mainstream politics.

Same vows and venue

In his 12-minute speech, the AAP chief hit out at “mainstream politics” over a dozen times, even as he promised change through corruption-free alternative politics. Mr. Kejriwal had proposed the same model at the same venue in 2013, as the chief of a new party yet to come to power. Over the next few years, he addressed several more media interactions at the Constitution Club, where he targeted mainstream parties. 

In January 2014, addressing party members in the run-up to the Lok Sabha election scheduled later that year, the AAP chief read out a list of “corrupt” political leaders, which included names like P. Chidambaram and Rahul Gandhi of the Congress, and Samajwadi Party (SP) founder late Mulayam Singh.

“This is just the beginning. The list will grow. Should they be defeated this time or not,” he had asked the audience.

In 2019, Mr. Kejriwal tried to tie up with the Congress for the Haryana poll. But the alliance did not materialise. Ahead of the 2024 general election, the AAP national convener worked closely with many Opposition leaders he had termed “corrupt”, including those from the SP, under the INDIA bloc to take on the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance.

Back to basics

The AAP chief’s re-hyphenation of the BJP and the Congress signals that the party may be returning to the kind of politics that helped it come to power for the first time in the national capital in 2013.

His attempt at projecting the two national parties as part of the “corrupt mainstream politics” comes at a time when many leaders of the INDIA bloc, of which AAP and Congress are still members, have questioned the alliance’s viability.

Mr. Kejriwal ended his speech hoping that “AAP’s alternative politics will soon become the country’s mainstream politics”.