AAP role is to clean things up: Yogendra Yadav

Yogendra Yadav, Senior Aam Aadmi Party Leader, flayed the idea projected by certain sections that the on-going election is a fight between Bharatiya Janata Party’s Narendra Modi and Congress’ Rahul Gandhi.

“It will be a tragedy if one has to choose between Modi and Gandhi,” the former psephologist said.

The 50-year-old Yadav, who fought from Gurgaon on April 10 (third phase of the elections), is rallying in Pune and Maval region to promote the party candidates here.

He said that if parties like Congress, Nationalist Congress Party etc. are dynastic, then parties like BJP are dictatorial. “This country today is given a choice between dynasty and dictatorship... There are some choices, where the choice itself must be rejected,” Yadav said drawing whistles and applause from over a 1000-people who had gathered in an auditorium.

Amid drum-beats and sloganeering, Yadav ripped apart established parties for their dynastic roots.

“All parties are dynastic today. Sometimes I wonder, why parties keep long names like the Nationalist Congress Party etc… it would have been simple if one simple called them Sharad Pawar and Family, Thackeray and Sons, Chautala and Sons, Karunanidhi and sons, Lalu Prasad and sons, Gandhi and sons, son-in-law and daughter-in-law.”

He also took on Gujarat for claiming that it is developed.

“Where is health, education and infant care in Gujarat? It is one of the most backward areas in these spheres of development. How can such a state claim to be developed?” he mocked.

While giving credit to the volunteers for being the party’s biggest strength, Yadav claimed that AAP has changed the language of politics in this country.

“I am happy that people like Sharad Pawar are talking about solving corruption issues and Modi is talking about the common- man,” he said.

On the question of Arvind Kejriwal admitting that quitting the government was a mistake as was reported in The Times of India and The Economic Times, Yadav corrected, “Arvind has said that the way the government quit could have been better communicated to the people. We should have consulted the people. He has not said that quitting the government in Delhi is a mistake.”

He said that the party quit on the issue of principle in Delhi and lamented that much has changed in the last 50-years when the then Railway Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri quit on principle and people applauded.

When asked if the new party has learnt from its mistakes in Delhi and would not ally with any party if a similar situation were to present itself again, Yadav said, “From the Delhi experience, we have learnt that we should not answer such questions before the outcome of the elections. We will cross the bridge when we come to it. Our role in this election is like a soap and we are here to clean things up.”

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