Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party chief Arvind Kejriwal on Wednesday claimed that people’s perception that the Lok Sabha election was a fight between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Congress President Rahul Gandhi was a major reason for his party’s defeat. The other reason, he alleged, was that the overall atmosphere which prevailed in the country “rubbed off on Delhi as well”.

The Aam Aadmi Party was defeated in all seven Lok Sabha seats in Delhi. The party’s vote share was 18.1%, and it stood third in five seats and was runner-up in only two. The Bharatiya Janata Party won all seats with a vote share of 56.6%. AAP won only one seat out of the 40 it had contested across nine states and Union territories in India.

“The results didn’t meet our expectations,” Kejriwal admitted in a letter to AAP volunteers. “Post election ground analysis has revealed two major reasons. First, the atmosphere that prevailed in the country rubbed off on Delhi as well. Second, people saw this ‘big election’ as between Modi and Rahul and voted accordingly.” He added that they were unable to make people understand that they should have voted for Aam Aadmi Party in these elections as well.

However, Kejriwal said, people have been “enthusiastically assuring” him that they’ll vote for Aam Aadmi Party in the Delhi assembly elections that are due early next year. “On the brighter side, people have been enthusiastically assuring us that in the ‘small election’ for Delhi Vidhan Sabha, they will vote in the name of the incredible work we have done in Delhi,” he said.

He also referred to the various achievements of his government and said they were able to achieve their promises without increasing taxes, through honest intent and delivery and also managed to almost double their budget.