AAP-Congress forms panel to strengthen coordination for LS poll campaign in Delhi

New Delhi: The AAP and the Congress have formed a coordination committee for the Lok Sabha elections in Delhi and announced coordinators for each of the seven parliamentary constituencies here to ensure campaigns are held in a smooth and effective manner.

Under a seat-sharing arrangement between the two constituents of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA), the Congress has fielded candidates from three of the seven seats. The AAP is contesting the remaining four.

Polling is scheduled in the national Capital on May 25 in the sixth round of the seven-phase elections.

To start election campaign coordination at the grassroots with the Congress for the seven Lok Sabha seats in Delhi, AAP’s national general secretary (organisation) and Rajya Sabha MP Sandeep Pathak has constituted the coordination committee, handing over the overall responsibility of coordination to Durgesh Pathak, the AAP said in a statement.

Durgesh Pathak represents Rajinder Nagar in the Delhi Assembly.

Delhi Congress’ communications department chairperson and former MLA Anil Bhardwaj said, “Both Congress and AAP will announce an observer for each of the seven Lok Sabha constituencies in Delhi to ensure that the election campaigns will be held in a smooth and effective manner between the parties’ leaders and workers.”

“A meeting of the coordination committee will be held on Friday to draw up a roadmap for the joint campaigns of the INDIA bloc in all the seven seats. The programmes will include public meetings and roadshows in all the seven constituencies, jointly organised by the INDIA alliance,” he said.

After holding discussions with newly appointed interim president of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee, Devender Yadav, Bhardwaj said both Congress and AAP have resolved to work with complete coordination and understanding in the elections in Delhi to ensure victory in all the seats.

The decision to form the coordination committee was taken on Tuesday in a meeting of senior leaders of both the parties.

It was resolved in the meeting that a system be created under which both the parties will cooperate in campaigning for each other and contest the elections together.

Congress’ candidate for the Northeast Delhi Lok Sabha constituency Kanhaiya Kumar held a meeting with AAP Minister Gopal Rai at his residence to plan the campaign strategy, Bhardwaj said.

The responsibility of coordination in New Delhi Lok Sabha constituency has been given to AAP MLA Rajesh Gupta while the West Delhi coordination will be looked after by AAP MLA Naresh Balyan.