AAP MP Raghav Chadha, alongside Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal, announced that two-thirds of the party’s Rajya Sabha members are merging with BJP, invoking constitutional provisions to formalise the split.
New Delhi: AAP MP Raghav Chadha (centre), flanked by Sandeep Pathak (left) and Ashok Mittal (right), addresses a press conference on Friday, April 24, 2026, announcing that more than two-thirds of AAP's Rajya Sabha members are merging with the BJP. (Photo: ANI)
In a stunning political rupture, Aam Aadmi Party MP Raghav Chadha on Friday announced that seven of AAP’s ten Rajya Sabha members were merging with the Bharatiya Janata Party, with a signed letter of merger already submitted to the Rajya Sabha Chairman earlier in the day. The announcement was made at a press conference at the Constitution Club of India in Delhi alongside AAP MPs Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal.
The merger, which clears the two-thirds constitutional threshold required to avoid disqualification under the anti-defection law, marks the most significant organisational collapse AAP has faced since its founding, and comes after weeks of escalating internal war that Chadha had been signalling, with characteristic flair, in plain sight.
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Following the announcement, he also posted on X, “Today, exercising the provisions of the Constitution of India, more than two-thirds of the AAP MPs in the Rajya Sabha have merged with the BJP. Seven MPs have signed the document, which was submitted to the Hon’ble Chairman of the Rajya Sabha. I, along with two other MPs, personally handed over the signed documents.”
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Today, exercising the provisions of the Constitution of India, more than two-thirds of the AAP MPs in the Rajya Sabha have merged with the BJP.
Seven MPs have signed the document, which was submitted to the Hon’ble Chairman of the Rajya Sabha.
I, along with two other MPs,…
— Raghav Chadha (@raghav_chadha) April 24, 2026
The writing had been on the wall, or rather, on Instagram. On April 6, Chadha posted photographs of himself reading The 48 Laws of Power by American author Robert Greene, noting that “somebody gifted me a book this week” and that “the timing is hard to ignore.”
Greene’s first law advises making superiors feel comfortably superior – masking your brilliance until the moment you choose not to. “Some books arrive exactly when they are meant to,” Chadha wrote. Three weeks later, he had jumped ship entirely.
The trigger was blunt. On April 2, AAP replaced Chadha as Deputy Leader of the party in the Rajya Sabha, appointing Ashok Mittal in his place, a move widely seen as a punitive organisational shift. The party had also indicated that Chadha would not be allotted speaking time in the Upper House from the party’s quota, accusing him of engaging in “soft PR” and avoiding direct criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP on key Opposition issues.
Chadha pushed back hard. On April 3, he said he had been “silenced, not defeated.” On April 10, he posted a video of his parliamentary interventions, covering everything from data expiry and paternity leave to Punjab’s cancer train and MSP for farmers, writing: “With respect, to those questioning my parliamentary performance, I’ll let my work do the talking.” On April 8, he had reposted a supporter’s suggestion that he launch a “Gen Z party,” responding with a single word: “Interesting thought.”
On Friday, the subtext became text. “The AAP, which I nurtured with my blood and sweat, and gave 15 years of my youth to, has deviated from its principles, values and core morals. Now this party does not work in the interest of the nation but for its personal benefits,” Chadha said at the press conference. “For the past few years, I could feel that I am the right man in the wrong party. So, today, we announce that I am distancing myself from the AAP and getting close to public.”
#WATCH | Delhi: Addressing a press conference with Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal, AAP MP Raghav Chadha says, “The AAP, which I nurtured with my blood and sweat, and gave 15 years of my youth to, has deviated from its principles, values and core morals. Now this party does not… pic.twitter.com/fo301O1mkj
— ANI (@ANI) April 24, 2026
The seven MPs joining the BJP include Harbhajan Singh, Rajinder Gupta, Vikram Sahney and Swati Maliwal, besides Chadha, Pathak and Mittal, the three present at the press conference. The detail that lands hardest: Ashok Mittal, the very man AAP appointed to replace Chadha as Deputy Leader, has walked out alongside him.
A bitter rift surfaced within the Aam Aadmi Party after Rajya Sabha MP Swati Maliwal accused a close aide of party chief Arvind Kejriwal of assaulting her last year, triggering a political and legal storm that exposed internal fault lines.
The controversy centred on Bibhav Kumar, a senior aide to Kejriwal, the main accused in the case. The incident allegedly took place on May 13 at Kejriwal’s residence in New Delhi, where Maliwal accused Kumar of physically assaulting her during the visit.
The episode widened cracks between Maliwal and sections of the AAP leadership, with the MP’s public stance seen as a direct challenge to the inner circle of Kejriwal.
“We have decided that we, the 2/3rd members belonging to the AAP in Rajya Sabha, exercise the provisions of the Constitution of India and merge ourselves with the BJP,” Chadha said, invoking the Tenth Schedule provisions that permit a merger if at least two-thirds of a legislative party’s members back it, shielding all seven from disqualification.
#WATCH | Delhi: Addressing a press conference with Sandeep Pathak and Ashok Mittal, AAP MP Raghav Chadha says, “We have decided that we, the 2/3rd members belonging to the AAP in Rajya Sabha, exercise the provisions of the Constitution of India and merge ourselves with the BJP.” pic.twitter.com/K3IK4TPXml
— ANI (@ANI) April 24, 2026
For AAP, the arithmetic is brutal. The party loses its entire effective Rajya Sabha presence in one morning. For the BJP, it is a bloodless gain of seven upper house MPs. For Arvind Kejriwal, who co-founded AAP with Chadha over a decade ago, it is a personal and political blow.
AAP was swift to retaliate. Senior party leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh called the merger a BJP-engineered operation, saying the central agencies were being deployed as instruments of political coercion. “Operation Lotus is being executed on the Punjab government. ED, CBI is being used to execute this Operation Lotus,” Singh said, adding: “The people of Punjab will never forget these traitors.”
#WATCH | Delhi | AAP MP Sanjay Singh says, “Operation Lotus is being executed on the Punjab Government…ED, CBI is being used to execute this Operation Lotus…The people of Punjab will never forget these ‘traitors’…” pic.twitter.com/VXKN4hPbmk
— ANI (@ANI) April 24, 2026
AAP national convenor Arvind Kejriwal launched a sharp attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party following a split within the party, alleging that the Centre’s ruling party has once again “betrayed the Punjabis.”
Reacting to the development, Kejriwal took to X to express his disappointment and accused the BJP of undermining the interests of Punjab. “BJP ne fir se Punjabio ke sath kia dhakka,” he wrote.
बीजेपी ने फिर से पंजाबियों के साथ किया धक्का
— Arvind Kejriwal (@ArvindKejriwal) April 24, 2026
In a video post, political analyst Tehseen Poonawalla called the news of MP Raghav Chaddha and six other Aam Aadmi Party members of Parliament from the Rajya Sabha, including ex-cricketer Harbhajan Singh and Swati Malewal, joining the BJP a “karma served to Arvind Kejriwal”. He added, “There is hardly anyone whom Arvind Kejriwal hasn’t deceived, and what has happened to him today is karma being served.”
Poonawalla also highlighted what Arvind Kejriwal did when he formed his own political party. He said, “Kejriwal promised he wouldn’t have security. He roamed around with Z plus security. He promised he wouldn’t have government accommodation. He made a sheesh mahal. In fact, he even aligned with the Congress party, the very party that he abused and came into power.”
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