Aam Aadmi Party or AAP is an Indian political party established by a group of politicians who strategically launched themselves as anti-corruption crusaders uninterested in doing politics. It was established on 26 Nov 2012.

The Congress led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) second term was riddled with corruption and the BJP and nationalists in India were about get the political benefits of the mega sized scams in India, ranging from 2G Spectrum Scam to Coalgate and other scams.

In 2011, before BJP could turn the public anger into an anti-corruption movement, an anti-corruption advocacy group named Indian Against Corruption (IAC) and with a demand of creating an ombudsman to check into corruption though Jan Lokpal Bill emerged as an alternate to BJP.

The allegedly apolitical group named IAC was headed by a self-proclaimed Gandhian activist named Anna Hazare and his aide Arvind Kejriwal, an ex-civil service official. The duo claimed that they would clean the system through the force of activism and have no political agenda.

The group started getting support from the youth due to the dream and tokens of honesty it offered. Many corrupt people also started supporting the movement in order to get a verbal certification of being honest. The group literally distributed honesty to anyone who supported them.

The year 2011 saw their skyrocketing publicity and initial offensive against Congress. As they entered 2012, the group started creating a narrative that both the ruling Congress and opposition BJP is corrupt. The group started experimenting their narrative to create a vacuum for a political space for themselves.

By mid 2012, the group had contradicted itself that they have no political agenda. They started peddling a narrative of revelation that without entering the system one can't change the system. The vulnerable youth again fell for their narrative and accepted their political ambition in November 2012 when they publicly transformed into a political party.

That is how Aam Aadmi Party was born through a strategic deception and drama.

Aam Aadmi Party rode on the Delhi Rape Case 2012 aka Nirbhaya Rape Case or Damini Rape Case to further garner their political ambitions and create space among the angry youth impractically expecting swift results.

The party announced its political belief as populism. centrism, and ideology as Gandhism. Since it was established in Delhi it had strongest support base in Delhi though it reached out to every state.

India's national politics is largely decided by communal overtones- Congress practising Muslim appeasement and BJP riding on the issues of secular biases against Hindus by most political parties. But for Sikhs, both BJP and Congress were against Khalistan. In Punjab, Aam Aadmi Party started pampering and pandering Khalistanis and secured presence in Punjab.

Since 2013, Aam Aadmi Party has secured three terms in Delhi and since 2017 in Punjab it secured one term as main opposition and one term as ruler in Punjab.

The party has been implicated in 2021 Oxygen Scam and 2023 Liquor Scam or Excise Scam and the founder and supremo of the party Arvind Kejriwal has been arrested and jailed in charges of scam, money laundering etc by CBI ad ED- India's special law enforcement units for tackling serious crime and corruption cases and financial frauds.

The party saw a gradual abandonment by its core founders- from Kumar Viswas, Kapil Mishra, Yogendra Yadav, Kiran Vedi etc as the party started behaving in contradictory manner mainly riding through visible drama.