Explosive letter of Admiral Ramdas, senior party member and internal Lokpal of AAP clearly indicates to massive rift and bickering within the party. He raises flags on post convener, participation of women and inner party democracy in AAP.

Amidst report of internal fighting with AAP and PAC members, Admiral Ramdas to PAC members is enough to show the kind of rift within party. In his letter, he raised several points

Issues raised my the senior leader are:

# Why no national convener of AAP?
Can the chief minister of a state and the national convener if he/she be the same person be in a position to discharge both the the duties efficiently? Do we need co-conveners? What kind of profile are we looking for? Whether we like it or not, today we are a national party and we can no longer keep our vision limited to Delhi or some region within the capital. The Delhi results have also impacted at the national level and expectations have been aroused amongst all aam aadmi supporters outside the capital and across India. We need to recognise this and programme ourselves accordingly.

# Dissent and democracy: There has been criticism within the party regarding decision making and inner party democracy. This needs to be further analysed by an independent, group who should carry out an internal audit and make suitable recommendations in keeping with the Constitution and the high standards of probity and ethics that we have charted for ourselves.

# Volunteers and management of volunteers:  Volunteers are our life line. We neglected and took for granted our volunteers and their commitment, especially after the national elections in 2014. This may well have been, one of the contributory factors for the emergence of AVAM. We need to learn the right lessons from this experience and put in place robust mechanisms and people to handle this resource.

# Conspiracy theories, trust deficit and communication failures: During the past six to eight months there has been an object breakdown in communications and mutual trust amongst the topmost leadership of the party.

# Reconstitution of PAC and NEC: We need an open discussion on how, when and whether bodies like the NEC, PAC, and even the National Council might need to be  reconstituted to better represent  region/geography, gender, ethnic and other forms of diversity, as well as to reflect the current developments in the party. I was both surprised and disappointed at the manner in which decisions were taken at the Delhi NEC meeting in June 2014, be it on expanding the PAC or inviting new members onto the NEC.

# Systems, discipline, confidentiality and ethics: I have spent my life in a disciplined service, where secrecy and maintenance of confidentiality is often a matter of life and death. Frankly I have been aghast at the way in which decisions taken in our meetings are leaked within minutes where conversations are recorded and uploaded, and sting operations conducted with little or no accountability.

# Gender justice and women in AAP: Finally last but not least, we need to make much efforts in the direction of becoming a genuinely gender sensitive party which will do far more than pay lip service to womens empowerment and ensure that we work to improve womens visiblity and participation at all levels. I personally find. It is difficult to defend AAP against accusations of being mainly a 'Boys Club' especially when we were not able to have even one women in our team of ministers!

# Conflict resolution, ombuds-persons, seniors advisory councils: The sheer time and energies that have been consumed in the past year and more in addressing various levels and kinds of conflicts and problems shows us that this is an area which will continue to exist and will continue to demand a council of elders, of people who can give of their time and wisdom, to anticipate, head off, and resolve, debilitating disagreements and conflicts.

We must accept with all humility, that we are all on the learning curve. It is important that we give out clear signals that all senior members of the party, primarily the PAC, are together and united. Let us be positive and not resort to any form of hasty action against our members.