HYDERABAD: Jairam Ramesh, the general secretary of the Congress, said on Tuesday that Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) is running in the Gujarat polls to support the BJP.

He asserted that Congress and the BJP are engaged in a battle in Gujarat and that AAP entered the competition to erode Congress support. He was speaking at a news conference during Rahul Gandhi's Bharat Jodo Yatra which entered Hyderabad today morning.

The former union minister asserted that AAP is involved in shadowboxing with the BJP and has no foothold in Gujarat. "We see no distinction between the BJP and the AAP in terms of how their leaders are campaigning and bringing up issues. The two sides are boxing in the shadows" he said.

Through advertisements produced by AAP governments in Delhi and Punjab, he claimed, a false sense of the party's power was conveyed. "Congress and the BJP are engaged in conflict in Gujarat. The BJP's backup unit is AAP. AAP is running to split the votes in Congress "added he.
The Congress leader claimed that in 2012, an agitation supported by the RSS gave rise to the AAP. He claimed that the AAP was created as a result of the RSS's stance against corruption in India.

The Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM) was also targeted by the Congress MP, who referred to it as the BJP's B team. In order to reduce the number of votes that the Congress party receives, he said that both AAP and MIM are members of the BJP's B squad.

In response to a question, he stated that MIM was formerly a component of the UPA and was on Congress' oxygen cylinder. "MIM is currently on the BJP's oxygen cylinder. MIM offers the BJP a shot in the arm. Together they are." He all but ruled out a reconciliation between Congress and MIM. "I don't think this would happen," he continued, "the way they are busy contesting elections in Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra and other states at BJP's request to cut into Congress votes."

He said that a divorce has taken place. "This is a single Talaq, not triple ," he added.

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