A rookie political party that made fighting corruption the focus of its campaign, will attempt to form a government in New Delhi with the party it helped remove from power in local assembly elections earlier this month when it loosened the grip of the established politicians on the capital. The Aam Aadmi or Common Man, Party, led by former tax inspector-turned antigraft campaigner, Arvind Kejriwal, had requested to form a government in the capital after conducting opinion surveys over the Internet, SMS and public meetings to gauge support for doing so. More than 500,000 people, via the party’s website, SMS and public meetings, gave their mandate to AAP to form the next government in Delhi.  The AAP took 28 seats in the 70-member assembly polls earlier this month, reducing the Congress party’s 48 seats to eight, and preventing the main opposition, the Bharatiya Janata Party, from getting a clear majority.  After the poll results, Mr. Kejriwal initially said his party would not enter an alliance with the Congress or the BJP, which placed first with secured 32 seats. But, after holding a crowd-sourced vote over the past week, the leader held a meeting with Delhi’s lieutenant governor asking for his permission form a government with outside support of the Congress. The consent of India’s president will now be sought. The party, which was born out of a wave of anti corruption sentiment that swept India that year, has between 15 to 20 days to prove that they have the support to form a legitimate government. If unable to do so, the capital will fall under president’s rule for the coming months until a revote takes place during national polls due by May.

(Wall Street Journal)