NEW DELHI: India’s anti-corruption crusader Arvind Kejriwal announced Monday he would head a state government for New Delhi in a stunning breakthrough for his fledgling party just months before a general election.

The former tax official is set to become chief minister in a minority administration after his Aam Aadmi (Common Man) Party won the second highest number of seats in the state assembly polls earlier this month.

The Congress party, which is in power at national level and ran New Delhi for years before being trounced in the state elections, said it would provide support for a Kejriwal-led government but would not join it.

“The people of Delhi want us to form the government. We are ready to form the government,” he told reporters, as elsewhere AAP supporters danced in celebration and waved brooms — the party’s symbol for a clean sweep of graft-ridden politics.

Kejriwal had been wary of accepting support from either Congress or the BJP, given that many voters cited the two parties’ record on corruption as their reason for siding with Aam Aadmi.

But an Aam Aadmi official said that 74 percent of supporters who took part in an informal poll had endorsed the idea of it forming a government. The party has tapped into anger about everyday scandals that have embroiled the government.

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