Lagatar24 Desk
Surat, April 15: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) suffered a blow in Surat, Gujarat, when six of its municipal officials switched allegiance to the governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a party official said on Saturday.
In the presence of Gujarat’s Minister of State for Home, Harsh Sanghavi, these corporators joined the BJP late on Friday night.
The AAP put up a strong performance in the February 2021 Surat Municipal Corporation elections and emerged as the opposition party by capturing 27 seats in the 120-member civic council. The Congress failed to secure a single seat, while the BJP won 93 seats.
In February 2022, five AAP corporators switched to the BJP, however one of them later joined the AAP again. The AAP now has 17 members after six additional corporators joined the ruling party BJP.
Minister Sanghavi remarked at their welcome ceremony, “AAP corporators resigned from their party and joined the BJP.”
“The way AAP leaders spared nothing to defame Gujarat and people of the state, corporators of AAP joined the BJP with a pledge to develop their respective wards,” the minister added.
Ruta Kheni, one of these six corporators, claimed that she joined the BJP as a result of being influenced by the BJP’s ideology and PM Narendra Modi’s functioning style.
Prior to the December 2022 Assembly elections, the Arvind Kejriwal-led AAP’s confidence had been strengthened by its strong showing in the Surat city body elections in 2021. Despite running for all 182 Assembly seats in the 2022 elections, it only succeeded in winning five, and none of them were in Surat.
The AAP’s state wing claimed that its corporators were being threatened and persuaded into joining the BJP.
Rachna Hirpara, an AAP corporator, claimed that the BJP has been attempting to persuade AAP corporators to change their allegiance ever since they won the election.
“Offers have been made to us ever since we won the election. BJP has been giving offers, and many corporators fell for it and took up to Rs 50 lakh to join the ruling party,” she alleged.
AAP corporator Dipti Sakariya said in a video statement that she was invited to a BJP minister’s home in the state capital of Gandhinagar and offered money to join the party.
“I informed our general secretary Monoj Sorathiya about what was going on. Meanwhile, the matter came out in the open after AAP corporators joined the BJP. It is sad to see the manner in which the BJP is misleading them to join the party,” she said.
