The Aam Admi Party has named former Infosys chief financial officer and director V Balakrishnan as its candidate from the Bangalore Central constituency in the forthcoming Lok Sabha polls. Speaking to CNBC-TV18’s Nayantara Rai, Balakrishnan says he does not wish to fight against Nandan Nilekani, who will be contesting elections from South Bangalore constituency. Balakrishnan will be up against PC Mohan of BJP, the incumbent parliamentarian.
Talking about Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP’s populist measures such as free subsidies with respect to water and power in New Delhi, Balakrishnan says one cannot rule out the use of populist measures by political parties as a huge portion of India’s population is still below poverty line. “You need to have a balance in the economy where not only you need to have capitalistic policies but also ensure that people below poverty line get their due,” he adds.
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Below are excerpts from the interview:
Q: You are going to compete from the Bangalore Central constituency. Any reason why perhaps you didn’t want to oppose Nandan, your former colleague from South Bangalore?
A: Nandan is ex-colleague and I told him that good people should go to Parliament. So, if you look at Aam Aadmi Party policy we are against communalism, we are against crony capitalism. We don’t want people from the dynasty to go to Parliament. It is not fair for me to fight against Nandan Nilekani. My house is also in central. So, I thought I will fight from central and do whatever I can to the people in that area.
Q: Whether we talk about free subsidies with respect to water and power in New Delhi, attacking corporate houses by the Aam Aadmi Party, where do you stand in all of this?
A: If you look at political parties, everybody comes with some kind of populist measures because you have a huge population below poverty line. So, you need to have a balance in the economy where not only you need to have capitalistic policies but also ensure that people below poverty line get their due. So, there needs to be a balance and that is what AAP is also doing.
If you listen to what Arvind Kejriwal spoke in Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) he clearly laid out the economic policies for AAP. We are talking about clean governance, crony capitalism and effective governance. So, as long as you make the balance I think it is okay.
Q: If I were to talk about your ticket – Central Bangalore in particular, what will be your election manifesto made up of, what are you telling people of Central Bangalore, why should they vote for you?
A: If you are MP from a particular constituency, you need to raise issues of both the city and the state effectively in the parliament. You need to be a pressure group to make sure the decisions done at the parliament are effective and good for nation. Thirdly, we should also create a structure within the constituency to get views of the people and how to address those issues and also become a brand ambassador for the city and the state and effectively represent them in the parliament and I will try to do all of those.
Q: There have also been certain reports that you are going to play a major role in Arvind Kejriwal reaching out to India Inc. How true or false is that news and is that also one of your roles in the AAP to connect the top leadership with corporate India?
A: If you look at what AAP stands for, we are talking about a clean and clear transparency in how parties raise money. If you look at last few years, 70 percent of money raised by all the mainstream political parties comes from unknown sources. So, AAP is making a difference in the political system by creating more transparency in the way they collect money for fighting elections. Arvind is coming to Bangalore, he is spending some time in various constituencies. They are using that to reach out to people within the city where they can interact with him and dinner is a consequence of this. The main reason is they have to meet Arvind, understand his thinking and policies much more effectively.
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