New Delhi: Fourteen years after it emerged from the anti-corruption movement with a promise to redraw India’s political map, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is facing one of its toughest setbacks, as seven of its members from Rajya Sabha ranks walked away in a rare, coordinated move Friday.
Born in the November winter of Delhi in 2012 out of street protests and citizen anger against graft, the party quickly turned into a formidable political force, clinching back-to-back victories in Delhi -first in 2013, then in 2015 and 2020 later expanded its footprint to Punjab.
Many of those who stood by the party in its early years – activists, professionals and political first-timers – helped build it from scratch. Over time, however, several of these early companions drifted away, citing differences over leadership style and direction.
The latest blow came Friday, as the majority of AAP’s Rajya Sabha MPs announced their exit, joining the BJP.
The scale of the defection – amounting to nearly two-thirds of the party’s strength in the Rajya Sabha – has raised questions about internal cohesion in a party that once prided itself on collective leadership and a decentralised nature.
The defected group was led by high-profile faces Raghav Chadha, Sandeep Pathak, and Ashok Mittal. Cricketer-turned-politician Harbhajan Singh, Swati Maliwal, Rajinder Gupta, and Vikram Sahney were the other four who quit the party.
By moving as a bloc, the defectors have strategically met the two-thirds threshold required under the anti-defection law to merge with the BJP without losing their seats.
For the AAP, the timing is particularly crucial. The party is gearing up for electoral battles in Gujarat, Goa, and Punjab in 2027, when it hopes to consolidate and expand its presence beyond Delhi, where it holds a strong base.
AAP leaders have sought to project confidence, maintaining that the party’s grassroots connect and governance plank remain intact despite the departures.
The AAP currently holds 22 seats in Delhi legislative assembly after it lost power to the BJP in 2025. In Punjab where it currently holds power, AAP has 92 seats.
In 2022, the AAP made a debut in the Gujarat legislative assembly with five MLAs.
In Jammu and Kashmir AAP got its first MLA in 2024.
In Parliament, AAP currently has six MPs, three each in Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. From Punjab, AAP has three Lok Sabha and one Rajya Sabha MP and rest of the two Rajya Sabha MPs are from Delhi.
The recent departure, however, has thinned the party’s presence in Parliament.
The Arvind Kejriwal-led party is now recalibrating ahead of the upcoming elections, the challenge before it is not just electoral arithmetic but also preserving the spirit and members that powered its rise.
