AAP’s 1st Haryana Poll List Amid Impasse In Alliance Talks With Congress

New Delhi: The Aam Aadmi Party has released a first list of 20 candidates for next month’s Haryana Assembly election, including naming 11 to contest seats against the Congress. A second list will be released soon, the AAP’s state chief, Sushil Gupta, said, suggesting the end of any alliance with its INDIA bloc ally. 

Last week Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal’s outfit was in ‘wait and watch’ mode amid stalled seat-share talks. The two parties reached an ‘in-principle’ agreement last month to re-form an alliance that stopped the BJP from a second successive clean sweep of the state’s 10 Lok Sabha seats.

However, talks hit a roadblock over the number of seats to be allotted to the AAP; the Delhi party reportedly wanted at least 10 but the Congress was only willing to give up seven. On Saturday the Congress’ state-in-charge, Deepak Babaria, said his party would offer only a “small number” of seats.

The following day the AAP’s Raghav Chadha spoke of “desire, wish, and hope for an alliance” from both parties, but warned a deal might not happen, saying”… if there is no win-win situation, we will leave it…”

Nevertheless, he said he was optimistic about reaching an agreement.