New Delhi: Aam Aadmi Party on Wednesday congratulated the Delhi voters for "shedding their apathy" and creating a record turnout of 66 per cent in the Delhi Assembly elections.
"The AAP salutes the citizens of Delhi for turning out in large numbers for inaugurating transformative politics in India. The voters of Delhi have shed their apathy and indifference and have created a new record turnout," AAP leader Yogendra Yadav said.
The Arvind Kejriwal-led party said AAP has turned its very first election into a quest for alternative kind of politics.
"Unlike the established political parties, AAP began its campaign nearly six months ago. This campaign would be remembered for many firsts. This was the first experiment of large scale `crowd-sourcing` of clean money for honest politics," he said, adding the party had set a target for Rs 20 crore donation, accounted for every single donation, and closed the donations once it achieved its target.
He said, "For the first time a political party had promised to withdraw any tainted candidate and we actually lived up to our promise by withdrawing a candidate."
This was the first time a political party issued constituency-level manifestos for each of the constituencies it was contesting, Yadav said.
"The outcome of this extraordinary campaign is still awaited," he said.
"AAP entered politics at a point when people had lost faith in politics, when politics had become a dirty word. No one believed that elections could be contested honestly. Thus AAP may have contributed in its small way to restore the spirit of volunteerism and idealism in politics," Yadav said, praising its thousands of volunteers from India and abroad.
"AAP salutes their untiring effort," he said.
The party also lauded Election Commission for being pro-actively non-partisan in the conduct of elections.
Yadav, however, claimed they had received some complaints from a few constituencies about "large-scale deletion of genuine voters, non-functioning EVMs, and about partisan behaviour of the polling staff."
"These complaints were especially serious from the New Delhi constituency. We are confident that the Election Commission will look into these complaints seriously, punish the guilty, and rectify the mistakes," he said.
