NEW DELHI: Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Singh Mann on Wednesday said Aam Aadmi Party will win all 13 Lok Sabha seats in Punjab and asserted that his party had nothing to do with the Congress in the state. “Punjab will become a hero in the country and the AAP will win 13-0 in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls,” Mann said when asked about possible alliance with the Congress in the state.
When questioned about breakdown of talks between the Congress and Trinamool in West Bengal and Mamata Banerjee’s announcement to fight Lok Sabha elections alone, Mann said “Maybe they are having talks at that level, but in Punjab we are not doing any such thing. We have nothing to do with the Congress.”
He further said discussions have already taken place on the AAP’s probable candidates for the 13 seats and the names of 40 probable candidates have come up. “There are three to four probable candidates per Lok Sabha constituency. Surveys will be conducted and we have kept winnabilty as the criterion (for fielding a candidate),” he said while speaking to reporters after chairing a Cabinet meeting.
Punjab chief minister’s remarks come even as the national leadership of the two parties are engaged in seat sharing negotiations for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The Congress and the AAP, who are political rivals in Punjab and Delhi, have already held two rounds of talks. Also, the two parties recently stitched an alliance to contest the mayoral post in Chandigarh as allies.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress had won 8 Lok Sabha seats in the state while the AAP had emerged victorious in just one seat. However, in the assembly elections in 2022, AAP decimated the Congress as it won 92 out of the 117 seats. The grand old party could win only 18 seats as it was voted out of power. The AAP’s voteshare was also nearly 20% more than the Congress.
This perhaps explains why it will be very difficult for the two parties to reach an agreement on seat sharing in the state. While the AAP is confident about extending its winning streak to the national polls, the Congress hopes to recover some lost ground. Little wonder, the state unit of both the parties are strongly opposed to any alliance.
When questioned about breakdown of talks between the Congress and Trinamool in West Bengal and Mamata Banerjee’s announcement to fight Lok Sabha elections alone, Mann said “Maybe they are having talks at that level, but in Punjab we are not doing any such thing. We have nothing to do with the Congress.”
He further said discussions have already taken place on the AAP’s probable candidates for the 13 seats and the names of 40 probable candidates have come up. “There are three to four probable candidates per Lok Sabha constituency. Surveys will be conducted and we have kept winnabilty as the criterion (for fielding a candidate),” he said while speaking to reporters after chairing a Cabinet meeting.
Punjab chief minister’s remarks come even as the national leadership of the two parties are engaged in seat sharing negotiations for the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The Congress and the AAP, who are political rivals in Punjab and Delhi, have already held two rounds of talks. Also, the two parties recently stitched an alliance to contest the mayoral post in Chandigarh as allies.
In the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, the Congress had won 8 Lok Sabha seats in the state while the AAP had emerged victorious in just one seat. However, in the assembly elections in 2022, AAP decimated the Congress as it won 92 out of the 117 seats. The grand old party could win only 18 seats as it was voted out of power. The AAP’s voteshare was also nearly 20% more than the Congress.
This perhaps explains why it will be very difficult for the two parties to reach an agreement on seat sharing in the state. While the AAP is confident about extending its winning streak to the national polls, the Congress hopes to recover some lost ground. Little wonder, the state unit of both the parties are strongly opposed to any alliance.