Explained | Why is the Congress reluctant in forging an alliance with AAP in Delhi?

Delhi Congress president and former chief minister Sheila Dikshit announced on March 5 that the Congress will not be stitching an alliance with Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) from Delhi for the upcoming Lok Sabha polls.

She declared that a unanimous decision was taken that there will be no alliance in Delhi, and that the decision was taken in a meeting presided over by party chief Rahul Gandhi.

What ensued before the announcement?

Since the time talks of an alliance between the two parties have been doing the rounds, it has been clear that the AAP national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has been keen on an alliance in order to take on the BJP, while the Congress has not been so enthusiastic about it.

Before Dixit declared her decision on March 5, a meeting was convened at the insistence of the national leadership of the Grand Old Party, in which almost all the leaders rejected the tie-up outright.

Earlier at a meeting on February 13 at NCP chief Sharad Pawar’s house, Rahul Gandhi had rejected the idea of an alliance, after which Delhi AAP convener Gopal Rai announced the candidates for six out of seven parliamentary constituencies in Delhi.

What is at stake for both the parties?

An alliance of the Congress and the AAP could have translated into electoral success in the upcoming Lok Sabha polls. Consider this: When the Modi wave was at its peak in the run-up to the 2014 general elections, the BJP had gotten 46 percent votes in Delhi, followed by AAP with 33 percent and Congress with 15 percent votes.

An AAP survey had earlier predicted that the saffron party may lose 10 percent of its vote share. To this, Kejriwal had said, “If these votes are polled by AAP, it will win all seven seats in Delhi by scoring 43% votes.”

Even if the BJP manages to retain its 2014 vote share, the combined vote share of the Congress and the AAP could have translated into winning all the seven seats in Delhi.

The alliance could have also resulted in better prospects for both parties in Punjab where the AAP wants the Congress to leave four of the 14 Lok Sabha seats for it.

Then why is the Congress reluctant to forge an alliance?

The reasons for this are multi-fold. First is apparent disagreement on seat-sharing. While the AAP is not ready to part with more than two seats, the Congress is demanding at least three seats. Besides, neither party has managed to zero in on a candidate from West Delhi. Both parties are mulling over fielding an Independent and the name of former BJP leader Yashwant Sinha is being discussed for the seat.

The second reason is the Congress’ belief that AAP has faced a decline in popularity and fortunes over the last four years. It lost to the Congress in the 2017 Punjab Assembly polls and a month later to the BJP in the Delhi municipal elections.

Read Also | Why does AAP want an alliance with Congress in Delhi?

The third reason is that AAP, which was born as an anti-corruption movement, took on the Congress for alleged corruption.

What is the history between the Congress and the AAP?

When the AAP first contested assembly polls in Delhi in 2013, the party had emerged second with 28 seats, after BJP which had won 31.

The AAP, which had been vocal against the Congress during their campaigns, had then taken support of the Grand Old Party, which had won eight seats, to form the government. This government barely lasted for a month and a half, with Kejriwal resigning as chief minister on the 49th day.

While announcing his resignation, Kejriwal had told his party workers that Congress opposed the Jan Lokpal Bill because he had acted against the corruption of Sheila Dikshit by filing cases against her, Union Minister M Veerappa Moily and Mukesh Ambani. He had said, "After (Mukesh) Ambani and Moily, (Sharad) Pawar's turn will come and then Kamal Nath. Because of this, Kejriwal has been removed. I am a small man. What is my status? I am not here for power."

In February 2014, Kejriwal had written to the then President of India to order a probe against three-time Delhi chief minister Sheila Dikshit to investigate her alleged role in the CWG scam and the street-lighting scam. In May 2014, the Congress had pledged not to support AAP in the eventuality of fresh elections.

Fresh assembly elections were conducted in Delhi in 2015, where Kejriwal contested against Dikshit from the New Delhi constituency, turning it into a battle of personalities.

Terming the move as foolhardy, Dikshit had said, “Who is Arvind Kejriwal? What is AAP? Can you call it a party that can be compared to the Congress or the BJP?"

Kejriwal had later won the seat with a margin of over 31,500 votes. The AAP swept Delhi winning 67 of the total 70 seats, while the Congress won nil.

Designing his campaign around the ‘corrupt party [Congress] vs honest party [AAP] narrative, Kejriwal had continued to attack corporate interests with audacious exposes of alleged wrongdoing. Some of his high-profile targets included Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra, India’s biggest construction company DLF, BJP president Nitin Gadkari and Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani.

Hence the friction between the two parties is only natural.

What remains to be seen is if the Congress is willing to split the secular vote in Delhi which might translate to advantage BJP, a fear that Arvind Kejriwal cited earlier today and what was cited by the Congress itself back in 2014.

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