AAP appoints former IIT-D professor Sandeep Pathak as its Gujarat in-charge

Sandeep Pathak (2nd from Right) poses with other members of the AAP. Credit: PTI Photo

With the state Assembly election nearing, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) on Monday appointed Sandeep Pathak, a PhD from Cambridge University, as the Gujarat in-charge. Pathak is said to be one of the brains behind AAP's election strategies in Punjab where it registered a thumping majority in recently held Assembly polls and formed the government for the first time.

In an official release, AAP Gujarat announced, "In view of the upcoming Gujarat Assembly polls, Aam Aadmi Party has appointed Dr Sandeep Pathak, who has a special place in Arvind Kejriwal's advisory team, as the person-in-charge of Gujarat."

The party said that Pathak resigned as an associate professor of the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and joined AAP and helped the party as an "election strategist" in the 2020 Delhi Assembly election and then in Punjab in the recently-concluded polls. Earlier in the day, the party nominated Pathak for Rajya Sabha along with four others including ex-cricketer Harbhajan Singh.

Also Read — Punjab cabinet: Bhagwant Mann retains Home portfolio, Cheema gets Finance

IIT-Delhi's Department of Energy Science and Engineering describes him as a "PhD from University of Cambridge, UK, in 2011. He spent two years at the Clarendon Laboratory (University of Oxford, UK) with Prof Henry Snaith as a postdoctoral fellow working on Dye-Sensitised Solar Cells and Perovskite Solar Cell." He also went to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, United States and in 2016 he joined IIT-Delhi as an Assistant Professor.

On April 2, Delhi chief minister and party's national convener Arvind Kejriwal and his party's first chief minister in Punjab, Bhagwant Mann are expected to hit the election campaigns in Gujarat. The party has sought police permission for taking out "padyatra" in Ahmedabad's middle and lower-middle-class dominated localities.

Kejriwal and Mann will be taking out "Tiranga yatra" on foot in Bapunagar and Nikol areas. These localities are dominated by Patidars and Hindi-speaking migrants. The march will start from Ambedkar Chowk/Ganpati Mandir in Bapunagar. It will pass through Bapunagar Khodiyar Mandir to Bapunagar crossroads, Diamond market (Sardar Patel Statue), Thakkarbapanagar, Jivanwadi, Khodiyar Mandir and would end at Nikol Gam.

Watch the latest DH Videos here: