After sweeping the 2022 Punjab election, the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) now wants to make their mark in West Bengal. The party is likely to hold a ‘Padarpan Yatra’ at 4 pm in Kolkata today. Though the AAP had several units in the state capital but some of them got merged with the TMC after 2015.

According to local AAP leaders, the party has had an “excellent performance” in Punjab, and want to celebrate the election results in West Bengal, kick-starting their campaign in the state.

The rally will start from Dharmatala to Girish Park in Kolkata. This is first such rally by AAP in the Mamata Banerjee-led state.

Not only rallies, AAP has started conducting membership drives in the state. Several hoardings and posters of AAP have emerged in Maldah district.

Party insiders say the AAP has built bases in every district of the state.

Chief minister Mamata Banerjee and AAP converner Arvind Kejriwal share a good relation but they were opponents in the Goa election and were seen criticising each other in every way.

Moreover, the attention that Banerjee received after winning the 2021 Bengal election, Kejriwal, too, has become the talk of the country after party’s record win in Punjab, by securing 92 seats of the 117-seat assembly.

Since the decimation of the Congress in this year’s state assembly elections, the AAP seems to have replaced the Grand Old Party in forming an alternate front in 2024. Experts say they believe AAP’s win in Punjab would help it be seen as a formidable alternative to the Congress.

West Bengal Congress president Adhir Chowdhury said, “The chances of Mamata is overtaken now by Arvind after Punjab. They will try to increase their base everywhere that’s what they are doing.”

Many political leaders are keeping a close watch on AAP’s activities. TMC general secretary Kunal Ghosh said., “They are a political party so they are doing just a programme. Mamata Banerjee is a three-time CM, a former railway minister, and has so many years of experience in Parliamentary politics. Let’s see what happens.”

No big names have surfaced on AAP’s guest list for today’s ‘Padarpan Yatra’.

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