The Aam Aadmi Party’s (AAP) Karnataka unit, which provided the financial ammunition to fight national parties like BJP and Congress, has much to cheer from the Delhi Assembly elections victory.

The party’s state unit raised close to ₹2 crore, which is second only to Mumbai and also contributed 300-400 volunteers to work in Delhi during the elections. The resources from Karnataka came at a crucial time when the party was short of funds, especially after Arvind Kejriwal quit as chief minister after 49 days in office.

The AAP always had good support in Karnataka. The party had contested 28 seats in the Lok Sabha elections, but drew a blank. It secured around 3 lakh votes and established its presence in all the 30 districts.

V Balakrishnan, former Infosys chief finance officer (CFO) and Prithvi Reddy, AAP’s National executive member, played a key role in party’s fund raising events. The party, on Tuesday, took out a rally in Bengaluru city centre to celebrate its victory.

AAP Karnataka has been constantly innovating in seeking funding from prospective donors. In the recent past, AAP Karnataka had launched the campaign, ‘Selfie with Mufflerman,’ to crowd-source funds from small donors. At the event, about 1,000 people signed up by paying ₹500 each.

The party was also able to collect additional funds of ₹5-6 lakh at the same event. To raise funds, AAP Karnataka also held month long fund-raising events like ‘Lunch with Arvind Kejriwal’, which required participants and donors to contribute a minimum of ₹20,000 to be able to attend the event.

Another similar event was held by AAP Maharashtra and the party went on to raise ₹91 lakh.

AAP has also launched ‘AAP Ka Daan’ (Your Donation) programme through which approved members of the party are authorised to collect donations in cash up to ₹10,000.

The authorised member carries a smart phone with an “app” that is connected to AAP’s website to display the donation amount and the donor receives an SMS of acknowledgement immediately.

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