AAP not to contest Maharashtra elections, Kejriwal to campaign for MVA

New Delhi, Oct 26 (PTI) The Aam Aadmi Party will not contest the upcoming assembly elections in Maharashtra. Instead, party chief Arvind Kejriwal will campaign for the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) coalition, AAP leader Sanjay Singh said on Saturday.

The MVA coalition comprises Uddhav Thackeray’s Shiv Sena (UBT), Sharad Pawar’s NCP-SP, and the Congress.

“In the Maharashtra elections, the party’s National Convenor, Arvind Kejriwal, will campaign for the MVA candidates. Aam Aadmi Party will not contest elections in Maharashtra,” Singh, who is a Rajya Sabha MP, said on X.

According to AAP sources, the Shiv Sena (UBT) and the NCP-SP contacted the party about Kejriwal campaigning in Maharashtra. Kejriwal is also set to campaign for Hemant Soren’s ruling Jharkhand Mukti Morcha in Jharkhand assembly polls, they said.

There are 288 assembly seats in Maharashtra, and voting will take place on November 20.

In Jharkhand, polling will be held in two phases on November 13 and 20, while the counting of votes in both states will take place on November 23.

AAP and the MVA constituents are part of the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA), which was formed before the 2024 Lok Sabha polls to take on the BJP.

AAP entered into an alliance with the Congress, the largest constituent of the INDIA bloc, in Delhi, Gujarat and Haryana for the Lok Sabha polls.

However, it contested on its own in Punjab.

It also contested the recent assembly elections in Haryana independently and failed to open its account.

The Congress is also a constituent of the MVA in Maharashtra and a part of the ruling alliance in Jharkhand.