Rise of AAP rebel Raghav Chadha: De-facto Punjab CM to ‘compromised’ leader to BJP
While announcing his decision to quit the AAP, Chadha claimed that the party that had once stood for honesty had become ‘mired in corruption’.
On Friday, Raghav Chadha announced he would join the BJP. He was once labelled the “de-facto Chief Minister” of Punjab, much to the chagrin of Bhagwant Mann, who helmed the state following the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP)’s landslide win in the 2022 Assembly elections. Now, Raghav Chadha has dealt a big blow to the party with which he had been since its inception ahead of the 2027 Punjab Assembly elections, claiming, “We, the two-third members belonging to the AAP in the Rajya Sabha, exercise the provisions of the Constitution of India and merge ourselves with the BJP,” in a press conference on Friday alongside former AAP colleagues who have also joined the BJP, Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal; the latter had replaced Chadha in the Rajya Sabha on April 2.
While announcing his decision, Chadha added that the AAP’s other Rajya Sabha MPs Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta, Vikram Sahney and Swati Maliwal had joined the BJP with him, along with Pathak and Mittal. Chadha, once considered Arvind Kejriwal’s blue-eyed boy, claimed he distanced himself from party activities as he did not want to be a part of their “crimes” and claimed that the AAP had “fallen into the hands of corrupt leaders”.
For Chadha, who came to be known as the backroom strategist who helped script the AAP’s historic rise in Punjab ahead of 2022 polls, life has come full circle.
In the run-up to the 2022 elections, Chadha emerged as one of the most influential figures in the party’s state unit. Though Mann became CM, Chadha, a young, articulate strategist, was widely viewed as the party’s troubleshooter and de-facto CM in Punjab’s political circles.
He played a key role in candidate selection, campaign messaging, and organisational structuring, earning the trust of party chief Arvind Kejriwal. His elevation to the Rajya Sabha from Punjab in 2022 further cemented his stature as AAP’s national face with deep influence in the state. He was given a posh official Punjab government bungalow in Sector 2 of Chandigarh, close to the CM’s official residence. The house number 50 was also known as a power den. He went around the state with Punjab Police security, held meetings with bureaucrats, was even the final authority to effect administrative rejig and transfer IAS and IPS officers.
At the time, the Opposition had called him an “extra-constitutional body”. The fact that he chaired important governance meetings of bureaucrats, often invited criticism for the AAP-led government. On July 11, 2022, he was appointed chairman of a temporary government advisory committee. He was tasked with advising on matters of public importance, specifically finance and the implementation of pro-people initiatives.
The government appointed him as an adviser to the Punjab government amid a flurry of allegations that he was “running the show” in the border state. “He wielded absolute power. The Personnel department was with Chadha. He was effecting transfers and handling all affairs of the government. All the bureaucrats used to visit his house. He would chair the meetings without CM Mann being absent,” recalled Iqbal Singh, a former spokesperson of AAP, who later rebelled and quit.
“They wanted to make him the ‘Super CM’ by appointing him as chairman of the advisory committee. The proposal was sent for legal advice. The legal advice said that he cannot be made the chairman as it would be unconstitutional. Anmol Rattan Singh was the AG then. He had to resign,” said Iqbal Singh. Anmol Rattan Singh had later resigned citing personal reasons.
The run-up to 2024 Lok Sabha elections scripted a different story for Punjab and Chadha. Before the elections, when Kejriwal was arrested on March 21, 2024, in the alleged excise policy scam, Chadha left for the UK to get an eye surgery. He returned in May-end, staying largely absent from the party’s campaign. He held a few rallies in Punjab as the elections were scheduled on June 1.
Ever since, his visits to Punjab had decreased. After the AAP lost the Delhi Assembly elections in February 2025, Chadha’s visits to Punjab turned infrequent as former Delhi Deputy CM Manish Sisodia was appointed the state AAP in-charge in March 2025. Chadha was seldom seen in governance meetings as Sisodia and former Delhi minister Satyendar Jain took over the decision making. In late 2025, Chadha was asked to vacate his official bungalow.
The clearest sign of his diminished clout came when the AAP removed him as its deputy leader in the Rajya Sabha, replacing him with Ashok Mittal on April 2. The move, officially presented as an organisational change, was interpreted as sidelining. The situation escalated when Chadha publicly reacted, saying he had been “silenced, not defeated,” hinting at internal suppression. Chadha also alleged he was prevented from speaking in Parliament.
An AAP insider alleged that Chadha had tried to get himself designated as the party’s Leader in the Rajya Sabha when Sanjay Singh was behind bars following his arrest in the Delhi excise policy case in October 2023. This, and his actions over the past year, had influenced the party’s decision, he added.
“One of the biggest factors that appears to have weighed on the party’s senior leadership is Chadha engaging in behind-the-scenes manoeuvring to get himself designated the AAP’s Leader in the Rajya Sabha when Sanjay ji was behind bars following his arrest in the excise policy case in October 2023. When this failed, he went to Punjab, where he started throwing his weight around and interfered in government matters by citing his closeness to the national leadership in Delhi,” said an AAP leader.
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