The Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party have reached a ‘principal understanding’ to ally ahead of next month’s Haryana Assembly election, sources told NDTV Tuesday evening.
The next step is divvying up the Assembly’s 90 seats – a potentially tricky topic. AAP Rajya Sabha MP Raghav Chadha and Congress General Secretary KC Venugopal will meet tonight or tomorrow to sort this out, sources said. The deadline for nominations is October 4 with voting on October 5.
There is no word on this alliance, should it hold through the Haryana election, extending into 2025 and the Delhi Assembly election, in which the AAP has triumphed every time since 2013 but faces a stern test this time, with Chief Minister and party boss Arvind Kejriwal still in jail in the liquor policy case.
All of this comes hours after it emerged that Rahul Gandhi, the Leader of the Opposition, suggested the INDIA bloc members continue the partnership formed before the April-June general election.
READ | Rahul Gandhi Urges Congress To Consider AAP Deal In Haryana
Sources said Mr Gandhi wanted to retain the alliance to guard against division of votes.
In the 2024 Haryana Lok Sabha election, the Congress and AAP split the state’s 10 seats 9:1.
The Congress won five from its share. The AAP lost the one seat it was contesting – Kurukshetra – to the BJP’s Naveen Jindal by around 29,000 votes. The two parties got 21.19 per cent and 1.11 per cent of the votes, respectively. Combined, this was well below the 36.5 per cent amassed by the BJP.
Also, the Congress’ vote share was lower than it managed in the 2019 Lok Sabha (in which the BJP got over 58 per cent of the votes) and Assembly elections (the BJP got 36.49 per cent).
Nevertheless, the consolidation of the Congress and AAP’s voter bases helped the INDIA bloc claim the five Lok Sabha seats that stopped the BJP from a second straight clean sweep in the heartland state.
It is also important the Congress, and the opposition, continue momentum generated by the party and INDIA bloc’s strong showing in the general election, with statement performances, if not wins, in the four remaining state polls this year. The other three are Maharashtra, Jharkhand, and Jammu and Kashmir.
READ | J&K To Vote In 3 Phases, First Assembly Polls Since Article 370
Unfortunately for the AAP, the party lost the one seat it contested.
This means the Congress sees itself in a position of strength ahead of seat-sharing talks.
And that tallies with what sources told NDTV this morning – the Congress’ Haryana leadership responded tentatively to Mr Gandhi’s urging. Ex Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda apparently demurred giving up more than four seats. The AAP, though, reportedly demanded as much as 20.
At a meeting of its Central Election Committee on Monday (the CEC is the Congress’ highest decision-making body), the party apparently finalised names for 49 seats.
The party may re-nominate a majority of its sitting MLAs. On the new faces shortlist are Rajya Sabha MPs Kumari Selja and Randeep Surjewala and a high-profile surprise – wrestler Vineet Phogat.
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