AAP's Win Well-deserved in ‘Face of Regime's Dirty Tricks’, Says Former Party Member Yogendra Yadav

New Delhi: Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) rebel Yogendra Yadav on Tuesday put out a tweet congratulating the party for its landslide victory yet again in Delhi.

“Congratulations Aam Aadmi Party for a well-deserved victory in the face of dirty tricks of the regime and a docile EC (Election Commission),” he said in the tweet. “Congratulations to people of Delhi for defeating the most vitriolic campaign of communal hatred in recent times and stopping it from becoming a national template.”

According to late afternoon trends, the AAP is set to win 63 seats in Delhi, four short of its mark in the 2015 Assembly elections. The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), on the other hand, will most likely end up with seven seats, four more than the last time.

Yadav in the recent past has stayed away from commenting on his previous party. In an interview on February 8 to ‘The Indian Express’, he had said, “I have my opinions about AAP and its leadership — and these are no secret — but I cannot let it cloud my judgement about the overall context of these elections or to be used by the BJP and its friends in the media.”

In August 2018, the now Swaraj Abhiyan chief had expressed his disappointment with the party.

“The AAP was a movement, but is now like any other political party. It represented hope; it was a moral project. Today, it is not,” he had told ‘India Today’ in an interview.

The AAP was in one of its biggest crises in 2014 when a letter, written by Arvind Kejriwal's right-hand man Manish Sisodia to Yadav, accused the latter of “trying to finish off the party or Arvind Kejriwal".

In his response, Yadav had written another letter to senior party members in which he had accused Kejriwal of falling victim to “the disease of personality cult".

Given Sisodia’s close proximity to Kejriwal, his letter was widely regarded as having the leader’s endorsement.

On March 4, 2015, Yadav was voted out of the AAP’s Political Affairs Committee. Around two weeks later, he was expelled from its National Executive for alleged “anti-party activities”. In April, he was expelled from the party.

Yadav denied being involved in anti-party activities and stated that he was victimised for challenging the “dictatorial ways” of party chief Arvind Kejriwal.