The Aam Aadmi Party formally declared on Thursday that it was going alone in Punjab and also named three candidates in Assam for the Lok Sabha polls, turning up the heat on the Congress.

AAP national general secretary (organisation) and MP Sandeep Pathak told reporters here: “We hope that the INDIA bloc will accept this and extend its support to the AAP candidates on these seats…. The purpose of forming an alliance is to win elections, that is why everything should happen in a time-bound manner."

“We are in talks regarding seat-sharing in other states…. For Punjab, the state units of AAP and the Congress had agreed that both the parties would contest elections separately. In Punjab, AAP and the Congress will contest the Lok Sabha elections separately and there will be no alliance,” Pathak said.

AAP’s Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann has publicly been denying chances of an alliance in Punjab. His party swept the 2022 Assembly polls, winning 92 of the 117 seats, but lost the bypoll to the Sangrur Lok Sabha seat he vacated to separatist politician Simranjeet Singh Mann.

A party source said: “Now is a good time to use strong-arm tactics with the Congress. In Uttar Pradesh, the Samajwadi Party has declared seats without consulting the Congress. The Congress is on the back foot as it is falling apart. By playing hardball now, we need to secure at least five Lok Sabha seats in Haryana, which is imperative for our growth.”

The source added: “Unfortunately, the Congress doesn’t see survey data and past results in the way that we do. At one stage, we were even willing to let the Congress keep the six seats they currently hold in Punjab, despite Bhagwant’s disapproval.

“The Congress feels it can damage our prospects in four to five seats in Punjab. We believe that we can do the same to the Congress in 12 to 16 seats all over India. A political consultant advised Arvind (Kejriwal) that if you don’t believe in yourself, the Congress won’t either. Expect to see Arvind asserting himself more in the near future.”