BJP lost, not me : Kiran Bedi

New Delhi, While giving AAP national convener Arvind Kejriwal the credit for winning the elections, the BJP’s chief-ministerial candidate, Kiran Bedi, today sought to deflect the blame for her party’s defeat in the Delhi Assembly elections.
She said she had not lost; rather, she had given the elections her best. It was the BJP that had lost and needed to introspect, Kiran Bedi, who lost her own contest in Krishna Nagar, told the media outside her residence. She also called Krishna Nagar, a BJP stronghold nursed by top party leader Dr Harsh Vardhan, the most neglected and dirty constituency.
However, she added, “I got complete support of the cadres. I remain a proud member of a party whose leadership is in great hands.”
She attributed AAP’s victory to the five years of work that Arvind Kejriwal had put in among the urban poor. “I am sure Arvind and his team will give all that he has promised to Delhi’s poor as soon as possible. Confrontational approach will not work now, but cooperation will,” she said.
“It is for the BJP leadership to introspect and find the reasons for the defeat. I am part of the BJP. I don’t regret any of my decisions,” Bedi said, adding, “The BJP made me a member without taking any money.”
Also, at no stage had the party leadership “put a gag order on me. What wrong did I say?” she asked.
Kiran Bedi thanked the BJP leadership, specifically mentioning Prime Minister Narendra Modi and party president Amit Shah. “They accepted me into the party, and we were in alignment on the value system,” she asserted.
PTI adds: Having got the better of his more fancied opponent in the BJP stronghold of Krishna Nagar, Aam Aadmi Party’s SK Bagga said the saffron party’s Chief Ministerial nominee, Kiran Bedi, was an outsider to the constituency.

“I was confident of winning from day one. I belong to the area of Krishna Nagar, but Bedi was an outsider. This is a victory of the common man and not any particular party,” he said after the results were declared.

“I am going to work for the common man for the next five years. I have to make Krishna Nagar a model constituency,” he said.

Bagga defeated the former IPS officer by a margin of 2,277 votes from the seat which had stood by BJP even during the 15 years of Congress rule under Sheila Dikshit.

Senior BJP leader and Union Minister Harsh Vardhan had been winning the seat before he vacated it following his election to the Lok Sabha and the BJP pitted Bedi from here in the hope that this was a “safe” constituency where her victory was certain.