A month after Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) convener Arvind Kejriwal got a legal reprieve in the Delhi excise policy case, the party more or less showed its Punjab Rajya Sabha MP, and the ex-Delhi Chief Minister’s former protégé, Raghav Chadha the door on Thursday. The party wrote to the Rajya Sabha Secretariat proposing Ashok Mittal as his replacement, with the change reflecting in the Rajya Sabha website showing Mittal as the AAP’s deputy leader in the House.

AAP insiders said the party’s communication to the Rajya Sabha Secretariat “did not even mention Chadha” and simply sought the appointment of Mittal as deputy leader. According to party insiders, it was evident that a storm was brewing when Chadha, who joined the AAP in 2012 and has been in the Rajya Sabha since 2022, was not included in the party’s list of star campaigners for the coming Assembly elections in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Assam and Puducherry.

Party insiders also emphasised that they had not asked for the time allocated to Chadha to speak as MP to be curtailed.

The move comes amid Chadha’s prolonged silence on matters related to the party, and his absence from several public events led by AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal. While AAP sources said there was “no particular trigger” behind the decision, they confirmed that the party had been biding its time. The sources, however, said the timing of the move was “surprising”.

Party sources said Chadha had been unavailable “at crucial junctures”, including the AAP’s show of strength following the discharge of Kejriwal and Manish Sisodia from the excise policy case in late February, and had “gradually grown more distant” from AAP and its senior leadership. While thanking AAP leaders and their families for their support, Kejriwal did not mention Chadha.

Party sources pointed to his absence during Kejriwal’s imprisonment in the excise policy case — Chadha was in London for an eye surgery procedure, and said that he had participated “sparingly” in the run-up to the 2025 Delhi Assembly polls. While there are no allegations of “anti-party activities” against him, insiders said they were not surprised at what had happened, given “his actions” over the last four years.

Sources said Chadha was unlikely to be formally suspended from the party, and would be allowed to continue as one of the AAP’s 10 members in the Rajya Sabha “until he chooses to”.

‘Interfered’ in Punjab government

Beginning with a team of volunteers comprising young professionals and academics associated with the India Against Corruption movement, Chadha, a chartered accountant by training, quickly rose through the ranks of AAP. From helping draft the then Kejriwal government’s Delhi Budgets, to advising AAP’s senior leadership as one of the nine members of the party’s Political Affairs Committee, he played a key role.

He unsuccessfully contested the Lok Sabha elections from South Delhi in 2019, a year before being elected as an MLA in the Delhi Assembly elections. Before completing his term as an MLA, he was picked for the Rajya Sabha in March 2022 from Punjab.

Soon after, the party’s senior leadership faced charges, investigations and arrests — starting with the arrest of Satyendar Jain, the then Delhi Health Minister, in May 2022; AAP communications in-charge Vijay Nair in September 2022; the then Deputy Chief Minister Manish Sisodia in February 2023; Sanjay Singh in October 2023; and Kejriwal himself in March 2024.

AAP insiders alleged that during this time, Chadha was found to be “interfering” with the affairs of the Bhagwant Mann-led Punjab government, as well as seeking to “enhance his profile in Rajya Sabha”. They said he was “unavailable” at critical junctures, and even stayed away from the Delhi poll campaign, only appearing “at a single press conference”.

In a post on X earlier this week, Chadha had expressed praise for the Udaan Yatri cafe at the Mumbai airport in NDA-ruled Maharashtra.

Chadha’s office on Thursday said he would not issue a statement for now. In a post on X, he shared a video compilation of his speeches in the Rajya Sabha, raising issues from data security to paternity leave.

Mittal, his replacement, played down the change as a routine process. “Earlier, N D Guptaji was deputy leader, then Raghavji, then me; tomorrow there will be someone else. The party wants all its MPs to learn… hence, I have probably been given this role,” he said.

AAP’s leader in the House, Sanjay Singh, only said the party had written to the Rajya Sabha Secretariat to apprise it of its decision, declining to comment further on the matter.