Route to Congress-AAP alliance: Tantrums, manoeuvres, reality check

New Delhi: Eight months after the first meeting of I.N.D.I.A parties in Patna where Arvind Kejriwal threatened not to return to the bloc, the AAP and Congress have covered a long distance of agreements and disagreements to stitch alliances in four states and a union territory.

It also comes exactly a month after Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann said “nothing like that (alliance) will happen in Punjab”, the party born out of an anti-corruption movement against the Congress made public its final call on seat-sharing arrangements in states sans Mann’s territory.

The Arvind Kejriwal-led party’s political manoeuvre while fighting against each other in Punjab has ignited fresh hopes in Congress in taming Trinamool Congress to earn respectable seats in the eastern state, especially after Mamata Banerjee’s acerbic statements.

While the Assembly is an easy game for AAP, the support of the Congress is needed particularly in Delhi for a decent fight against BJP in the Lok Sabha polls with Muslims remaining circumspect about Kejriwal after the 2020 Delhi riots and moving to the Congress.

While doubts about AAP remained, Kejriwal drove to Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge’s residence on January 13, minutes after an I.N.D.I.A. online meeting. He told Kharge and Rahul Gandhi that they may have to fight against each other in Punjab but that should not be a stumbling block elsewhere.

On February 18 after AAP appeared to toughen its stand by saying that Congress does not even deserve a single seat in Delhi, Kejriwal had a one-on-one with Kharge. On the same day, both were also seen at a lunch hosted by Rajya Sabha MP Abhishek Singhvi to send a ‘political signal’.

If Kejriwal showed reluctant pragmaticism in 2013 to enter the government, the relation between both the parties have never been this cordial especially after the AAP decimated Congress to irrelevance in Delhi politics.

Congress won zero seats in consecutive Assembly and Lok Sabha elections while it has a marginal presence in the corporation in Delhi. It also bore the brunt in Punjab in 2022 with AAP replacing Congress as the ruling party besides denting its prospects in Gujarat and Goa.

In 2019, AAP was keen to have an alliance with Congress in the Lok Sabha elections. Talks were held but some claim Congress’s insistence on certain seats led to the collapse of negotiations even though the then-party chief Rahul Gandhi was not averse to a tie-up.

Congress got a better vote share than AAP and ended up being the runner-up in five seats, giving a shocker to Kejriwal.

The latest round of bonhomie started in early 2023 though Delhi Congress leaders were not enthusiastic. AAP was a regular attendant in meetings called by Congress in the Parliament, unlike Trinamool Congress, and was at the forefront of protests when Rahul Gandhi was disqualified from the Lok Sabha.

Kharge returned the favour by dialling Kejriwal soon after the CBI summoned him in the Delhi excise case in April last year. Incidentally, Kejriwal also did not campaign in Karnataka during the Assembly elections in May last though his party contested over 200 seats.

However, the relation veered into trouble as the Modi government came up with an ordinance and subsequently a bill to restrict the Delhi government’s powers. As the Opposition bloc headed for their first conclave in Patna on June 23 last year, AAP threatened to walk out of the meeting if Congress did not announce its opposition to the Bill.

Kejriwal had a war of words with Congress leaders at the Patna meeting while allies felt AAP was being unreasonable as Congress said it would announce its stand at the right time. A draft resolution was ready but 15 parties that met in Patna decided not to release it after the AAP drama.

Just before the second meeting in Bengaluru a month later, Congress announced that it would oppose the Bill and AAP flew to the southern metro happily.

Interestingly, a senior Congress leader recalled they had faced a dilemma on which forum to discuss the issue, as Kharge had not constituted the Congress Working Committee. It was then that the decision to call a meeting of the Congress Parliamentary Strategy Group took shape, as the matter was linked to Parliament.

All was going well but mid-August again saw some trouble, as Delhi leader Alka Lamba said that Rahul Gandhi had asked them to prepare to fight all seven seats in Delhi. AAP was livid.

Earlier, leaders like Ajay Maken, Sandeep Dikshit and Arvinder Singh Lovely had made public comments against going with AAP like their Punjab counterparts.

As Alka’s comments created furore, Congress fielded its in-charge Deepak Babaria to douse the political fire who said the woman leader was not in the know of what the leadership is up to.

The next few weeks saw central leadership rein in Delhi leaders and the first indication came when AAP leader Sanjay Singh was arrested by the ED in the Delhi excise case. Delhi Congress president Lovely criticised the misuse of central agencies though his unit was the first to complain about the policy.

However, the central leadership of both parties allowed its Punjab leaders to go separate ways while making sure that they did not derail the larger plan. Kejriwal did make some noises during Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh but never allowed to derail seat sharing talks.

The growing bonhomie with Congress was evident as Kejriwal supported Mamata when she suggested that Kharge should be made the face of I.N.D.I.A bloc. He even argued how Kharge as Prime Ministerial candidate would impact 57 Lok Sabha seats.

Earlier, Kejriwal was also quick enough to dispel notions that he was nurturing Prime Ministerial ambitions. Last August when AAP chief spokesperson Priyanka Kakkar spoke about his suitability as Prime Ministerial face, he got senior minister Atishi to rebut it.

Over months, Kejriwal also built the base for the alliance with Congress and prepared his cadre. Sources said Kejriwal and his close aides prepared the ground well without compromising much and managing to extract goodies from the grand old party.