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Delhi

AAP to bury the past, send invites to Anna and Kiran

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal’s friends from the anti-corruption movement may have given him a cold shoulder and criticised his plans of plunging into politics, but Kejriwal seems to have let the bygone be bygone.

The party has decided to extend invitations to all those associated with the anti-corruption movement to attend Kejriwal’s swearing-in ceremony on Saturday. ‘Anna Hazare, Kiran Bedi, Santosh Hegde and all those associated with the anti-corruption movement will be invited to attend the swearing-in ceremony,’ sources within the party said.

Kejriwal and six other MLA will take oath on 28 December in a public ceremony at the Ramlila Maidan, the same venue where Anna Hazare fasted during the anti-corruption movement two years ago.

According to a statement from the Delhi Secretariat: ‘The President (Pranab Mukherjee) has directed that Kejriwal be asked to prove his majority on the floor of the House within seven days from the date on which he takes oath of office.’

AAP leader Kumar Vishwas said: ‘We have requested the Lieutenant Governor Najeeb Jung that we want to take oath on 28 December (Saturday) and he has agreed. The decision to opt for 28 December, instead of the earlier 26 December, was taken at a meeting of party leaders in Kejriwal’s Ghaziabad residence.’

Vishwas said the AAP will invite Gandhian activist Anna Hazare, former Supreme Court judge Santosh Hegde and former police officer Kiran Bedi for the swearing-in ceremony. Hegde and Bedi were part of the anti-corruption campaign. Kejriwal, who formed the AAP in November 2012, has since had a fallout with Hazare and Bedi.

One-year-old AAP had made an electrifying debut in elections winning 28 seats in the 70-member Assembly and decimating Congress which bagged only eight seats. The BJP, along with its ally SAD’s one seat, had 32 MLAs but the party declined to form the government, citing lack of majority.

Kejriwal had announced formation of AAP on 2 October, the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi.
The party’s name reflects the phrase aam aadmi, or ‘common man’, whose interests Kejriwal pledged to represent.
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