Kejriwal defeated Kejriwal : Know the reason why AAP collapsed

 In the 2015 assembly elections, AAP had won 67 seats. Then when the assembly elections were held in 2020, it got 62 seats and now in 2025 it could not even get 25 seats and it is far away from the magic figure of 36 for majority.

What could be the reasons for the defeat of AAP?

The party formed against corruption is itself drowned in corruption

Arvind Kejriwal's party has emerged from the movement against corruption. But while being in power for 10 years, serious allegations of corruption have been levelled against the top leaders of the party. Arvind Kejriwal, Manish Sisodia and Sanjay Singh had to go to jail in the excise scam. The party could not give proper clarification of the serious allegations levelled against it. Apart from this, the CAG report also accused AAP of corruption in the construction of hospitals etc. Instead of discussing the CAG report, AAP tried to ignore it. The result was that the party which came into existence against corruption remained surrounded by corruption allegations throughout the elections.

Liquor scam ruined the party

There was a lot of discussion about the liquor scam in Delhi. AAP was accused of cheating in the excise policy and taking crores of rupees in bribe. Along with Congress, BJP also publicized the liquor issue a lot. AAP could not answer this allegation. Since the court had given conditional bail to AAP leaders, they could not even talk openly on this matter.

BJP made a dent in free schemes

Actually, Kejriwal was confident of winning only on the basis of those voters who were the beneficiaries of his government's free freebies scheme. During the last two elections, Kejriwal kept promoting his politics through free electricity and water. These beneficiaries were from the middle and lower class. Before the Delhi elections, BJP tried to woo these voters. Union Home Minister Amit Shah in a public meeting and BJP President J P Nadda while releasing the party's manifesto publicly declared that no scheme for the benefit of the people will be stopped. On the other hand, to woo the middle class, the central government succeeded in wooing this large voter base of Delhi by making income up to Rs 12 lakh tax free in the general budget.

Muslim and Dalit voters distanced themselves

In the last two elections, AAP had got great success in Muslim and Dalit dominated areas, but this time these voters were seen distancing themselves from AAP in both the areas. In fact, whenever Muslims in Delhi faced difficult times, AAP remained silent instead of standing with them. The result of this was that Muslims did not support AAP unilaterally. This process resulted in the defeat of AAP candidates in close contests. 

Roads and clean drinking water were  big issues in Delhi. AAP had promised roads and clean water after winning the MCD elections, but it failed to fulfil these promises. After coming out of jail on conditional bail, AAP chief Kejriwal had promised to solve the road problem, but he could not fulfill it.

Loss of not forming an alliance with Congress

AAP has suffered a lot of loss for not forming an alliance with Congress for the Delhi elections and its game has been spoiled on many seats. Congress has got much more votes in this election than last time. At the same time, AAP candidates lost on most of those seats where Congress was in a strong position. Apart from Congress, Asaduddin Owaisi's AIMIM also caused some damage to AAP. AIMIM had fielded its candidates on two assembly seats in Delhi. However, both its candidates could not win.

Old promises were incomplete,new promises were not trusted

AAP promised to give Rs 2100 per month to attract women, which was the only big promise made by AAP in the entire election. The public did not believe this promise, because Kejriwal could not fulfil some of the promises made earlier and he also accepted it publicly. Among these, clean water, new colleges and cleaning of Yamuna were important.