Congress-AAP Tensions Flare Over Youth-Led Protest at Jantar Mantar

Tensions between the Congress and the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) have come to the fore at the Cockroach Janta Party's (CJP) protest stage at Jantar Mantar, with both parties facing accusations of trying to claim ownership of the youth-led agitation. The friction surfaced on Wednesday during an exchange between an AAP leader and an activist perceived to be close to the Congress. The interaction, which took place away from cameras, highlighted the political contest over a protest that has grown into one of the largest youth-led mobilisations in recent years. For the AAP, which exited the INDIA bloc in June 2025, the Congress's support for the protest came too late and, more importantly, on terms that the party believes undermined the movement. "The Congress, through its social media ecosystem, tried to damage the movement from the very beginning. When that narrative didn't work, they started saying there was no crowd and that the agitation was a flop. Once the movement acquired a life of its own, the Congress tried to take it over," an AAP leader told PTI . According to the AAP leader, Congress supporters on social media initially attempted to portray the campaign as "India Against Corruption (IAC) 2.0" — a reference to the anti-corruption movement from which the AAP emerged. The movement that contributed to the UPA government's defeat remains at the centre of the distrust between the Congress and AAP. The Congress has long maintained that the anti-corruption campaign had covert backing from the RSS-BJP. The distrust deepened after Arvind Kejriwal founded the AAP, which ended Congress's 15-year rule in Delhi in 2013, defeated it in Punjab in 2022 and emerged as a significant political force in Gujarat the same year, winning five Assembly seats and securing around 13 per cent of the vote share.