Bhagwant Mann seeks meeting with President, focus on AAP’s 3 Lok Sabha members

Six of the seven who crossed over to the BJP were sent to the Rajya Sabha from Punjab: Raghav Chadha, Sandeep Pathak, Ashok Mittal, Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta and Vikramjit Sahney. The seventh, Swati Maliwal, was sent from Delhi.

AAP’s three in Lok Sabha

While one of the AAP’s Lok Sabha members, Malvinder Singh Kang from Anandpur Sahib, has struck a discordant note, saying the party structure has become skewed and calling for better coordination between the party leadership and its MPs, MLAs and ministers in Punjab, the other two — Gurmeet Singh Meet Hayer from Sangrur and Raj Kumar Chabbewal from Hoshiarpur — told The Indian Express on Saturday that they were “not going anywhere”.

“The three MPs are being watched. As we have only three of them, the vertical division requires only two people to quit,” said a party source.

Kang has said that the party gave “too much power” to Chadha in Punjab, leading to centralised decision-making. He has also alleged that Pathak, the party’s strategist ahead of the 2022 Assembly elections, was neglected. According to Kang, Pathak told him that “nobody had contacted him in the last one year”.

Speaking to The Indian Express on Saturday, Chabbewal said: “There may be a buzz, but I am not going anywhere. I am happy in AAP. Whatever I seek for my constituency is done. There is no interference. Why would I switch to BJP? Look what they did to Capt Amarinder Singh. Where is Sunil Jakhar now? As Capt Amarinder says, BJP does not give importance to anyone, so why would anyone join them? I even got a call from the Chief Minister’s OSD yesterday, but it was not about this. It was regarding some work in my constituency.”

“I am a committed soldier of the party. I am with the party, will stay in the party. People will never forgive those leaders who ditched them. I am committed,” said Meet Hayer.

Kang, who rose from student politics, was with the BJP earlier, before resigning in 2020 to protest against the farm laws. He joined AAP in 2021, became the party’s chief spokesperson, and was elected to the Lok Sabha from Anandpur Sahib in 2024. He has occasionally taken positions at variance with the party line, including opposing the government’s land-pooling policy, which was later scrapped, and publicly raising concerns over alleged illegal mining under AAP rule.

Chabbewal, a doctor by profession, was earlier a Congress MLA. He joined the AAP ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in 2024, and won from Hoshiarpur (SC-reserved) constituency.

Meet Hayer was elected twice as an MLA on an AAP ticket — in 2017 and 2022 — before being fielded for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections from Sangrur, a seat earlier represented by Mann. A former president of the AAP’s youth wing, he is considered close to the party’s Delhi leadership.

Meanwhile, party sources pointed to the silence of the AAP’s Punjab president, Aman Arora, on the issue. While Arora put out a post on X on Friday, accusing the Rajya Sabha members of “breaking their trust”, he hasn’t spoken our publicly on the issue.

“His silence has now become politically significant. A state president is not merely an organisational functionary; he is the face of the party’s narrative in the state. At a moment of visible internal churn, his absence from the frontline of communication has only added to the speculation around AAP’s cohesion in Punjab,” said a party leader.

Mann show of strength

Mann’s move to meet the President is being seen as a show of political strength. It comes amid growing unease within the party ranks over possible attempts by the BJP to expand its footprint in Punjab through defections, ahead of the Assembly elections early next year.

His move to take the party’s MLAs with him aims to send a clear message — that they are firmly behind the party leadership.

Sources said the show of strength may be largely symbolic, but remains politically significant. At a time when Opposition parties have accused the BJP of engineering defections in non-BJP-ruled states, Mann’s strategy appears focused on pre-empting such developments in Punjab.

Chadha’s exit has raised questions about internal cohesion and triggered a broader political debate. Mann’s meeting with Murmu is, therefore, expected to serve both as a formal protest and a reassurance to party supporters that the Punjab unit remains united and prepared to resist any political poaching attempts, said a source.

AAP’s Sanjay Singh, also a Rajya Sabha member, has also said that they would write to the Rajya Sabha chairman to seek the disqualifcation of the members, saying it was “tantamount to voluntarily relinquishing membership of their original party under the Tenth Schedule of the Constitution.”

Chadha had claimed two-third strength (of the AAP’s total Rajya Sabha members) while announcing the decision, accusing the party of straying from its “principles, values and core morals”. “We have decided that we, the two-third Members of Parliament of the Aam Aadmi Party belonging to Rajya Sabha, exercise the provisions of the Constitution of India and merge ourselves with the BJP,” he had said.