Even as Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal Tuesday hit out at the Congress for deciding against a tie-up with the Aam Aadmi Party, senior AAP leaders maintained that the last word has not been spoken yet, and the party’s door “continues to remain open”. This was reflected in AAP Delhi convenor Gopal Rai’s statement, when he was asked if the Congress was driving a hard bargain by making such statements. “We will see,” he said. Incidentally, the AAP has already announced candidates for six out of seven Lok Sabha candidates in Delhi. In a tweet, the AAP chief said the “Congress was helping BJP by splitting anti-BJP votes”. “At a time when the whole country wants to defeat the Modi-Shah duo, Congress is helping BJP by splitting the anti-BJP vote. Rumours are that Congress has some secret understanding with BJP. Delhi is ready to fight against Cong-BJP alliance. People will defeat this unholy alliance,” Kejriwal tweeted. Party leaders also expressed surprise over the Congress’s “attitude”. “They are behaving as if they are in power while the reality is they don’t have a single MLA or MP from Delhi,” a leader said. The AAP also said that the “nation comes before the party” for it, while the “Congress has put its own interests before that of the country”. Stating that the AAP has taken up the task of “saving democracy”, Rai said the stand of the Congress, even in states such as Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, goes against the country’s mood, which is essentially about putting individual interests in the backseat and joining hands for the larger cause of defeating the BJP. “The Congress has not said that there will be a coalition with the AAP, but its statement makes it clear that it’s not just about Delhi. Its stand in other states like UP and West Bengal also goes against the general mood. It appears that the Congress has an undeclared alliance with the BJP. For the Congress, the party comes before the nation. Congress helped the BJP defeat the AAP in Punjab and they are making similar efforts in Delhi,” Rai claimed. He also alleged that the BJP has used its “Brahmastra” by politicising the India-Pakistan tensions, as its other key poll plank, “Mandir-Masjid”, has “flopped”. “The BJP is trying to stay afloat using the Army. If they have the guts to contest without latching on to the Army, they will come to know the country’s mood,” Rai said. While Kejriwal will not sit on any fast as planned earlier, the AAP will launch a campaign, involving 1,000 teams across the city, to press for full statehood on March 10, Rai said, reiterating that it will be the mainstay of the party’s Lok Sabha campaign.
