Delhi Election 2025: AAP releases first list of 11 candidates, 6 are defectors from BJP, Congress

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) announced its first list of 11 candidates on Thursday for the upcoming Delhi Assembly Elections. Six of the 11 candidates were defectors.

Six leaders from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress, who had recently switched to the Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP, featured in the list, news agency PTI reported.

Brahm Singh Tanwar will contest from Chhatarpur assembly constituency, Anil Jha will fight from Kirari and BB Tyagi from Laxmi Nagar. They had recently quit the BJP and joined the AAP.

Meanwhile, Zubair Chaudhary, who will contest from Seelampur, Veer Singh Dhingan, the candidate from Seemapuri, and Somesh Shokeen from Matiala had joined the AAP after quitting the Congress.

The other five candidate announced by the AAP are: Sarita Singh (Rohtas Nagar), Ram Singh Netaji (Badarpur), Gaurav Sharma (Ghonda) Manoj Tyagi (Karawal Nagar) and Deepak Singhal (Vishwas Nagar).

The names were announced after a meeting of the AAP's political affairs committee (PAC) headed by party convener Kejriwal. The AAP's national convenor said earlier that tickets for the elections would be distributed based on the work, public opinion and winning chances of the probable.

The elections for 70 seats in the Delhi Assembly are due in February 2025. The elections will be a three-way contest between the AAP, the Congress and the BJP. The AAP and the Congress are part of the Opposition's INDIA bloc at the national level, but decided to fight state-level polls separately.

Arvind Kejriwal said on Monday that his party is poised to secure an overwhelming majority in the 2025 Delhi Assembly elections, terming the electoral battle a "moral struggle" against the BJP.

He termed the coming election a "Dharm Yuddh" (crusade) and compared it with the mythical battle of Kurukshetra, contrasting the power and resources of the BJP with AAP's "steadfast commitment to truth and justice."

The AAP had won 62 of the 70 assembly seats in the last elections held in 2020.

(With inputs from PTI)