Jaitley admitted that his assessment about Delhi polls was a mistake, but added that he and Sushma Swaraj already knew there was an undercurrent going on in Delhi. He denied having said that the AAP would not get more than 6 seats in Delhi.
"Many people had this assessment (AAP wll not cross 6 seats), but it was not my personal assessment. It is my habit that whenever a party contests elections, I make an assessment, both politicial and through professional methods, on a regular basis.
" In the last one month it was clear to me and I had written in my blog two weeks before the polls that Congress would come to its lowest position, lower than even 33 pc that it got in 1977 and it was 25 pc.
"I also felt that in urban areas BJP's contest will be against AAP. Since their (AAP) campaign was silent, several candidates and party workers could not assess this, but when we sat with the leaders of Delhi, myself and Sushma Swaraj ji suggested several times that they should identify the undercurrent. Both of us had identified this undercurrent within the party."
Jaitley said, BJP's decision not to form a government in Delhi despite being the largest single party was not a mistake.
"I don't think it was a mistake. So long as we didn't have 36 seats, we couldn't have formed the government. We could have tried to break others, but we decided not to."
