AAP to announce Delhi Lok Sabha candidates next week

Ruling out an alliance with the Congress, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) said on Tuesday that it will decide the final list of candidates for Delhi's seven Lok Sabha seats in the first week of February after reviewing the performance of those named in charge of the seats.

"The party will announce its candidates for all the seven seats in Delhi in the first week of next month," senior party leader Gopal Rai, a Minister in the Arvind Kejriwal government, told IANS.

In June last year, the AAP had appointed five Lok Sabha in-charges for the parliamentary constituencies of Delhi: Pankaj Gupta (Chandni Chowk), Dilip Kumar Pandey (North East Delhi), Raghav Chadhha (South Delhi), Atishi (East Delhi) and Guggan Singh Ranga (North West Delhi).

There was speculation that the party had left the remaining two seats for Congress so that they contest the Lok Sabha polls as allies. In October, the AAP announced its in-chage for the New Delhi and West Delhi seats.

Brijesh Goyal was named in New Delhi and Rajpal Solanki in West Delhi. Later, Solanki withdrew due to poor health.

All the six in-charges are being considered as potential candidates.

For West Delhi, Rai said the party was working on possible candidates. "There are a few people we are considering."

Rai ruled out any possibility of any alliance with the Congress.

Although not official till now, AAP chief Kejriwal and others have addressed the in-charges as candidates and sought votes for them.

In December, Kejriwal sought votes for the South Delhi Lok Sabha seat in-charge Chadha even as the party had not announced him as the official candidate.

Similarly, last week, party leader Satyendar Jain, during the inauguration of a three-lane flyover in Mayur Vihar, had asked people to vote for Atishi to make her an MP from East Delhi for development in the area.

Speaking about the campaign, Rai said the door-to-door campaign of the party was on and the party will take the next step after the campaign got over.

After sweeping the 2015 Delhi Assembly elections, the AAP wants to bag the city's all seven Lok Sabha seats too. In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP won all the seven seats but the AAP came second everywhere, stunning the Congress.

--IANS

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