Amid reports of an alliance between the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Congress being called off in Delhi, Congress's National Media Panelist Aman Panwar, AAP's Joint Secretary Akshay Marathe and elections Analyst Amitabh Tiwari spoke to BloombergQuint on the aftermath of the move and how it will likely affect the parties’ performances in Delhi.
On being asked if the AAP had rejected an alliance with the Congress, Marathe said "It was the state leadership of the Congress in Haryana which refused to give any space to any other alliance partner."
"We wanted to have an alliance with the Congress just for this one reason that the Modi-Shah government has become so dangerous for the future of this country that even the AAP, which was born to fight the Congress, was ready to compromise and was actually willing to tie up with the Congress in the interest of this country," Marathe said.
"But it was only one week before the filing of nominations that Congress president Rahul Gandhi tweeted for the first time about this issue (of a possible alliance) and actually used the word U-turn to describe Kejriwal,” Marathe added.
“With this kind of language coming from the Congress, it becomes difficult to believe that the party was ever serious about the alliance,” he added.
Panwar, on the other hand, said "we are on a good wicket.”
"We were ready to offer the AAP four seats in Delhi but Kejriwal was hell-bent on the fact that he wanted seats in Haryana as well. (What they should’ve understood is that) an alliance at a national level has always worked on the state-wise formula," Panwar said.
Speaking on whether the two parties (AAP and Congress) could actually afford to come together in this election, Amitabh Tiwari said "the Congress and the AAP share an acrimonious relationship."
"Since Delhi has seven Lok Sabha seats, so it's (AAP-Congress fallout) not going to play a very important role in the government formation at the Centre," Tiwari said.
He, however, asserted that this could hurt the parties’ chances at the local level.
"But it does give an advantage to the BJP,” Tiwari said.
Now that the two parties are fighting independently for the seven seats in Delhi in the ongoing Lok Sabha polls, “the anti-BJP votes (will) get split between the AAP and the Congress.”
The BJP, on Monday, 22 April, named cricketer-turned-politician Gautam Gambhir as its candidate from the East Delhi Lok Sabha constituency.
The BJP also named Meenakshi Lekhi as its candidate from the New Delhi seat. Lekhi is pitted against AAP's Brajesh Goel and Ajay Maken of the Congress.
Gambhir is pitted against one of Aam Aadmi Party’s most prominent candidates, Atishi. The Congress too, has a strong contender in Arvinder Singh Lovely, representing the party on the seat.
Singer Hans Raj Hans will also be contesting the Lok Sabha polls from North West Delhi constituency on a BJP ticket. The singer will be contesting against the Congress’ Rajesh Lilothia and AAP’s Gugan Singh.
Responding to the Congress spokesperson's remarks about the party fielding senior candidates in Delhi, Marathe said "these are the same senior leaders who lost their deposits in 2015 (Delhi Legislative Assembly election)."
“The Congress has come at third (position) in every election in the last 4-5 years,” Marathe said, adding that at the end of the day, “the people of Delhi are going to make a simple choice: whether or not they want Modi (to be in power)."
In the 2014 general elections, the BJP had won all seven seats in Delhi.
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