E-Paper
‘Don’t think that situation will ever arise’: Jitan Manjhi on breaking alliance with Nitish Kumar
Grand Alliance: The HAM chief has also demanded that a coordination committee should be formed in the Mahagathbandhan.
Former Bihar chief minister and Hindustani Awam Morcha (HAM) party chief Jitan Ram Manjhi on Tuesday vowed his support to state chief minister Nitish Kumar and has demanded to constitute a coordination committee in the Grand Alliance or Mahagathbandhan, ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
Read here: Opposition sets sights on joint front for 2024 after Congress’s poll win
"Although there are no promises in politics. Still, I have vowed to support Nitish Kumar. Be it Congress or CPI(M), everyone has demanded that a coordination committee should be formed in the Mahagathbandhan", he told news agency ANI.
While speaking on breaking the alliance with Kumar, Manjhi said, "I don’t think that this situation will ever arise. Nitish Kumar has given me lots of respect, and he even made me the chief minister. If the situation ever arises (party and workers not getting respect at the time of the upcoming elections), our party workers have opined that we can even break our promise".
The Janata Dal (United) leader, who leads a coalition government in Bihar, has been meeting various leaders from different parties as part of his campaign for the last several months. He had met Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and party leader Rahul Gandhi in Delhi last month. Last week. he met Odisha chief minister Naveen Patnaik in Bhubaneswar, Jharkhand chief minister Hemant Soren in Ranchi and Nationalist Congress Party leader Sharad Pawar in Mumbai, with an aim of uniting the opposition to challenge the BJP in the upcoming elections.
After his meeting with Pawar, Kumar said he would be more than happy to see the NCP chief becoming the face of the opposition to challenge BJP.
Read here: Bihar: Nitish Kumar congratulates Congress as GA hails Karnataka poll results
The political parties across the states are looking to form a unified opposition in order to defeat the ruling BJP from centre. The got a major boost after Congress emerged victorious in the recently held Karnataka assembly elections. At least 12 major opposition parties are expected to meet in Patna to decide further course of action on the opposition unity, leaders of JDU and RJD said, a day after the Karnataka assembly elections were out.
