The AAP and the Congress have also reached a seat-sharing deal for Gujarat, Haryana, Goa, and Chandigarh.
New Delhi: The Aam Aadmi Party and the Congress have agreed to a 4:3 seat-sharing formula for Delhi to put up a joint fight in the upcoming Lok Sabha elections. They have also reached a deal for Gujarat, Haryana, Goa, and Chandigarh.
In Delhi, the Arvind Kejriwal-led party will contest four out of the seven seats – West Delhi, South Delhi, East Delhi, and New Delhi. The remaining three – North East Delhi, North West Delhi, and Chandni Chowk – will go to the grand old party.
In the 2019 election, the BJP won all seven seats.
The seat-sharing announcement was made during a joint press conference of the AAP and the Congress, weeks after the opposition’s INDIA bloc delivered their first electoral win in the Chandigarh mayoral poll.
AAP will contest from two seats in Gujarat – Bharuch and Bhavnagar – and one in Haryana – Kurukshetra. Both seats in Goa and the sole constituency in Chandigarh will be contested by the Congress. The AAP had declared a candidate for South Goa last week and will withdraw it to make way for its ally.
Seat-sharing has been one of the major headaches for the INDIA bloc with the aspirations of the regional parties dragging the negotiations. The Congress’s recent electoral setbacks in three heartland states have emboldened the regional powers to seek a bigger share of seats.
The Congress has already struck a deal with Akhilesh Yadav’s Samajwadi Party. The party will contest from 17 seats in Uttar Pradesh, which sends the most number of MPs to the Lok Sabha. A deadlock remains in Maharashtra with Congress and the Shiv Sena (UBT) yet to decide on eight seats.
West Bengal too remains a challenge for the Congress with Trinamool asserting yesterday they will contest all 42 seats. Sources said Trinamool isn’t ready to offer more than two seats to the Congress, which has been seeking at least five in the eastern state.
The INDIA bloc, which was set up last year to take on the BJP, has already lost two key members – Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal-United and Jayant Chaudhary’s Rashtra Lok Dal. Both have aligned with the BJP.
