lok-sabha-elections

Updated: Mar 05, 2019 13:30 IST

The Delhi Congress on Tuesday began talks to devise its strategy for the Lok Sabha elections , in a meeting called by party President Rahul Gandhi, days after the Aam Aadmi Party announced its candidates for six of the seven seats a move seen by many as a pressure tactic.

“The Congress president called a meeting, where leaders will chalk out the strategy for the Lok Sabha elections and discuss alliance options,” a party leader said.

While AAP has been open to a poll pact with the Congress, the leaders of the Delhi unit of the Congress have been divided on the issue with a section against any pact with Arvind Kejriwal’s party.

READ: Chemistry, not arithmetic, is roadblock to AAP-Cong pact

An AAP leader had on Sunday, speaking on condition of anonymity, not ruled out the possibility of reopening alliance talks if the Congress made a serious attempt and escalated the discussions to emissaries authorised by the top leadership.

He said, so far the Congress leaders who were in touch with the AAP never gave an impression that they had the mandate from the party president.

In fact, he added that signals received from the Delhi Congress leaders through Sheila Dikshit were to the contrary and not in favour of an alliance, frustrating and forcing the AAP leadership to announce the names of candidates on six seats.

“We want a structured dialogue. We lost patience with the on again and off again approach of the Congress that forced us to announce the names,” he said.

The AAP leader also linked the possibility of an understanding in Delhi with the agreement in Punjab, Haryana and Goa besides Chandigarh.

He reiterated if the Congress saw reason and is serious in defeating the BJP, a tie-up could still happen between the two parties.

The Congress favours de-linking the understanding with AAP in Delhi with other states and also insists that the tie-up will be restricted only to the Lok Sabha elections and not in the assembly or civic elections in the national capital in future.

In the list of candidates announced by AAP on Saturday, Atishi Marlena has been nominated to contest from East Delhi, Guggan Singh will contest from Northwest Delhi. AAP political affairs committee member Raghav Chadha will contest from South Delhi, while Pankaj Gupta has been nominated to contest from the Chandni Chowk seat. Dilip Pandey and Brijesh Goyal will contest from Northeast Delhi and New Delhi seats respectively.

The party has not yet decided who will contest from the West Delhi seat.