PANAJI
The Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party, the two constituents of the INDIA bloc alliance who have representation in the Goa legislature on Saturday jointly announced that both the Goa Lok Sabha seats -- North and South Goa -- will be contested by the former in the upcoming Parliamentary elections.
The announcement was made in Delhi by leadership teams of both the parties led by AICC General Secretary Mukul Wasnik of the Congress and AAP's General Secretary (Organisation) and Rajya Sabha MP, Dr Sandeep Pathak.
The deal means AAP will not go ahead with its plan of contesting on its own the South Goa seat, where it had earlier announced it would field its Benaulim MLA Venzy Viegas.
Meanwhile here in Goa, AAP's State convenor Amit Palekar and GPCC president Amit Patkar addressed a joint press conference where they said the coming together of the two support bases will help to emerge victorious in both the seats.
“We call other parties in Goa to join our force to defeat BJP; seat sharing has been worked out during INDI Alliance meet,” the Palekar-Patkar duo said.
Palekar said AAP in Goa has cleared the way in the interest of the alliance and to achieve the principal goal of fighting and defeating the BJP.
“We want all those MLAs who had asked votes against the BJP in 2022 election to support INDIA alliance candidate,” Patkar said
Both Palekar and Patkar also said that the Revolutionary Goans Party (RGP) will also be approached to join the fight against the BJP.
Patkar said: “I still appeal to them to come with INDIA alliance.”
The Congress-AAP deal announced by Wasnik in Delhi also includes seat sharing in four other States and Union Territories -- Chandigarh, Delhi, Haryana and Gujarat.
While AAP will contest four and the Congress three of the seven Delhi seats, in Haryana AAP will fight on one seat.
Chandigarh will be contested by the Congress and in Gujarat, the Arvind Kejriwal-led party will contest on two seats -- Baruch and Bhavnagar.
“In 26 seats in Gujarat, Congress will contest in 24 and AAP on two “ in Bharuch and Bhavnagar. In 10 seats in Haryana, Congress will contest in nine seats and AAP in one, at Kurukshetra,” Wasnik said.
Both the parties had previously announced the "consensual decision" that in Punjab where AAP is governing, there will be no alliance and both will fight separately due to local political realities and to prevent the BJP from usurping the Opposition political space.
