AAP allotted Lutyens Delhi bungalow as office
NEW DELHI: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has been allotted Bungalow No 1 on Ravi Shankar Shukla Lane in Lutyens Delhi for its new headquarters, the party said in a statement on Thursday.
Currently, the AAP operates out of 206, Deen Dayal Upadhyaya (DDU) Marg on Rouse Avenue Road near ITO. However, the space belongs to the Delhi judiciary, which sought to use this space to expand district judicial services.
“The central government has allotted new space for the headquarters of the AAP. The new address of the AAP headquarters will be Bungalow No 1, Ravi Shankar Shukla Lane, New Delhi,” AAP said in a statement.
It was not immediately clear when the AAP will move to the new location, which is a walking distance from the Mandi House roundabout.
Before it was allotted to the AAP, the bungalow was allotted to the Nationalist Congress Party. “It served as NCP’s national office between 2015 and mid-2021. Before NCP moved to this bungalow, it was allotted to a politician as a residence,” an official of NCP (Sharad Pawar) said.
AAP minister Saurabh Bharadwaj welcomed the development. “In 2014, we became a state party and qualified for office space in Delhi, but the central government did not give us space for an office. A government bungalow was allotted to us (for office space), and attempts were being made to oust AAP from its office and push it onto streets,” Bharadwaj said in a statement.
“Now, we are a national party and thus, qualify for one more office space... It is a common courtesy in politics that an office is allotted to a party. It is unfortunate that we had to approach court even for this. We welcome that with repeated directions of the court, the Centre was compelled to allot an office to AAP. They should have allotted the space before we moved the court,” Bharadwaj said.
On June 5, the Delhi high court said the AAP was entitled to a party office space in the Capital and asked the Centre to decide on the matter within the next six weeks. The direction came on a plea filed by the AAP.
The AAP was founded on November 26, 2012, by Arvind Kejriwal following the anti-corruption movement of 2011. In April 2023, the AAP was granted the status of a national party by the Election Commission of India.
In 12 years, the AAP has formed full-majority governments in Delhi and Punjab, won five assembly seats in Gujarat and has two MLAs in Goa.