AAP disengages from INDIA bloc, says alliance was only for 2024 LS polls
NEW DELHI: AAP on Tuesday disengaged itself from the INDIA bloc, saying the opposition grouping was formed only for the 2024 Lok sabha polls. It also alleged BJP and Congress had entered a 'secret, corrupt deal'.
The statement came as Congress and 15 other opposition parties wrote to PM Narendra Modi demanding a special session of Parliament on developments following the Pahalgam terror attack. AAP made the same demand separately.
AAP national media in-charge Anurag Dhanda said on X , 'The real alliance is between BJP and Congress behind the scenes. Rahul Gandhi says only that which benefits Modi politically. In return, Modi saves the Gandhi family from going to jail.
Neither of them is interested in providing basic facilities like schools, hospitals, electricity and water to the countrymen.'
'To clean Indian politics, we must end this behind-the-scenes collusion. Rahul Gandhi and Modi may appear as opponents on stage but the truth is that they've become guarantees of each other's political survival. Congress's weak politics empowers BJP, and BJP's rule hides Congress's corruption,' Dhanda alleged in a statement issued by the party later.
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Asserting that the INDIA bloc was formed specifically for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Dhanda said, 'The alliance ensured that opposition parties secured 240 seats – this is a significant achievement.' He drove home the point that the alliance as far as AAP had lived its purpose and the party was not part of the bloc anymore. 'AAP will contest every state election on its own. We will be contesting all seats in Bihar later this year, ' Dhanda told TOI.
'In Parliament, however, our MPs will support the opposition's position based on what is best for the country and our MPs will vote accordingly in both Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha,' Dhanda said.
AAP and Congress have had a turbulent equation even as INDIA bloc partners. After much to and fro on seat sharing talks and much resistance to the alliance from the Congress's Delhi unit, the two parties finally did fight as allies in Delhi and also in Gujarat and Haryana in the Lok Sabha polls but were pitted against each other in Punjab.
Later last year, the two parties failed to reach a consensus on seat-sharing in the Haryana assembly polls and fought against each other. In the Delhi assembly elections earlier this year too both parties fought a bitter battle that had put a big question mark on how both AAP and Congress would carry off as allies in the INDIA bloc.
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