"Another No-Confidence Motion Against Congress": BJP On AAP's Delhi Seat Offer

Reacting to the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) offering the Congress a single Lok Sabha seat in Delhi, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) National Spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla said that the Congress party has suffered another "no confidence motion".

"Today, yet another no-confidence motion has been passed against the Congress party by its own allies. A few days ago, Mamata Banerjee offered two seats, you don't deserve more than two seats or else I am fighting all the seats alone. In Punjab, AAP said 13 plus one Chandigarh seat, we are going to fight it alone," Mr Poonawala said, speaking to ANI about the recent snub received by the Congress from the AAP and the Trinamool Congress.

Speaking about Congress' alliance partners in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra, Mr Poonawala said, "In Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh announced his seats and said, Congress, you should take these many seats and be happy. In Maharashtra, Sanjay Raut said you (Congress) have to start from zero."

The BJP spokesperson said that this shows that the alliance partners of the Congress have no confidence in it and it has turned into an alliance to diminish the footprint of the Congress.

"So in every state, you can see that no alliance partner has any confidence in Congress party or in Rahul Gandhi. And therefore, this is not an alliance of 'Modi Hatao'. It is actually an alliance of 'Congress ko ghatao'," Mr Poonawala said.

Mr Poonawala said that the Congress should be given around 200 seats as all these parties have come into existence after eating into Congress' vote bank.

"Anyhow, Congress should be given 200 or less seats to contest across the country because Congress and these parties have come into existence after finishing each other's existence," he said.

Citing the example of the Aam Aadmi Party in Delhi, Mr Poonawala said, "Aam Aadmi Party came to power after killing Congress party in Punjab, in Delhi they came into power after killing Congress party in Delhi. So why would they like to revive the Congress party?"

Hitting out at Congress MP Rahul Gandhi, Mr Poonawala said that ever since the former started on his Nyay Yatra, his party has been losing out on its alliance partners or senior leaders within the party.

"Ever since Rahul Gandhi has started his Nyay Yatra, people are saying Bye Bye to him. We have seen how Mayawati said it, Mamata Banerjee said it, Milind Deora said it, Ashok Chavan said it. It was said in Bihar, in Uttar Pradesh, and the entire janata (people) are going to say bye bye to such an alliance," Mr Poonawala said.

Earlier in the day, AAP MP Sandeep Pathak said that even though the Congress party does not merit even a single seat in Delhi, in the spirit of alliance, the AAP party is willing to offer one seat.

The AAP plans to field candidates in the remaining six seats in Delhi, Mr Pathak added.

"You must have seen in the Delhi elections that the Congress party has zero seats in the Lok Sabha, zero seats in the Vidhan Sabha, and in the MCD elections, out of 250, only 9 seats have come to the Congress party. If you look at this data on a merit basis, the Congress party does not get a single seat, according to this data.

"But data is not important; keeping in mind the dharma of the alliance and the respect of the Congress party, we offer them one seat. So we propose that the Congress party fights on one seat and the Aam Aadmi Party fights on six seats," he said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)