AAP announces Amit Palekar as its CM candidate for Goa assembly election

|HT|

The Aam Aadmi Party on Wednesday named Amit Palekar as its chief ministerial candidate for upcoming assembly elections in Goa. AAP national convenor national Arvind Kejriwal made the announcement during a press briefing in Panaji, Goa. Kejriwal said that the party will be contesting all the 40 Assembly seats in Goa. AAP failed to win a single seat in the 2017 elections despite running an ambitious campaign, pitching 39 candidates for a 40-seat strong assembly.

Senior Congress leader P Chidambaram on Monday asserted that the contest in Goa assembly elections is between Congress and the Bharatiya Janata Party, the ruling party in the poll-bound state. In his assessment, Chidambaram said, the AAP and the Trinamool Congress will only "fracture" the non-BJP vote as has been "confirmed" by Kejriwal.

"Those who want a regime change (after 10 years of misrule) will vote for the Congress. Those who want the regime to continue will vote for the BJP," Chidambaram said in a series of tweets. Hitting back at Chidambaram, Kejriwal said people of Goa will vote where they see hope and "Congress is hope for BJP, not Goans".

The Delhi chief minister recently held a door-to-door campaign in Cortalim village of Goa. Kejriwal, who was the star campaigner for AAP last time, was seen interacting with voters in Cortalim.

Goa will go to the polls on February 14 and the counting of votes will take place on March 10.

AAP has already announced its chief ministerial candidate for the assembly elections in Punjab and Uttarakhand.

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