2024 Lok Sabha elections: Opposition meet on June 23, Congress brass to take part

The much-anticipated strategy meeting of Opposition parties for 2024 will take place in Patna on June 23. It was earlier scheduled for June 12.

The much-anticipated strategy meeting of Opposition parties for 2024 will take place in Patna on June 23, Bihar’s ruling grand alliance leaders announced on Wednesday. It was earlier scheduled for June 12.

Bihar Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav along with JD(U) National President Lalan Singh in Patna on Wednesday. (ANI)

In a hurriedly called presser, JD(U) national president and MP Rajiv Rajan Singh alias Lallan Singh and deputy chief minister Tejashwi Prasad Yadav said the meeting to form a combined anti-BJP front will be held on June 23 in Patna. Singh announced that Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and his predecessor Rahul Gandhi, who is on a US tour, have given their consent to attend the meeting.

The meeting on June 12 was cancelled when Kharge and Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin conveyed their inability to come to Patna on that day. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi was not available either as he had speaking engagements in the US. The leaders decided to defer the meeting as they wanted all party chiefs to be present.

A senior Congress leader said in New Delhi that after Patna, another two-three Opposition meetings are expected to be held across the country. The Congress and the DMK are likely to propose the next meeting be held in Chennai. Two more meetings might be held in Kolkata and Mumbai.

Singh said other top leaders expected to participate in the meeting include West Bengal CM and TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, Samajwadi party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, Shiv Sena chief and former CM Uddhav Thakeray, NCP patriarch Sharad Pawar, DMK chief and Tamil Nadu CM MK Stalin and top Left leaders including Sitaram Yechury of CPM, D Raja of CPI and Dipankar Bhattacharya of CPI-ML (Liberation).

Tejashwi said the meeting would be an important event for the country to send across a message of Opposition unity to fight the BJP’s autocratic way of governance and attempts to weaken the Constitution as well as the democratic fabric of the nation. “There is an undeclared emergency in the country under the rule of the BJP-led NDA at the Centre and those questioning the government’s policies are being harassed,” Tejashwi said. The JD(U) president echoed the view.

The announcement of the proposed Opposition meeting by the JD(U) president and the Bihar deputy CM is being seen as a bid by the GA leaders to dispel the notion that the initiative taken by chief minister Nitish Kumar to combine the Opposition parties to take on the BJP was falling apart in the wake of the postponement of the June 12 meeting.

There was also speculation that the top Congress leadership proposed that it would not contest less than 350 seats if it chooses to join the proposed front even as GA constituents are keen that the national party should contest 250 seats nationwide. State leaders said initial talks showed that the issue of Congress contesting fewer seats in Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and UP would be a thorny one.

The Congress, however, said no such demand has been put forward by the party. “In fact, we are yet to start preparing for the Lok Sabha election. After Karnataka, our focus is on the upcoming assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh,” said a senior Congress strategist.

JD(U)’s chief spokesperson KC Tyagi , earlier on Wednesday, said the meeting would be held in Patna and also remarked that “everybody joining the proposed front has to make sacrifices in terms of seat sharing”.

Meanwhile, asked about reports that the Congress is keen on contesting 350 seats as a major partner in the proposed front, the JD(U) national president said all such matters related to seat sharing would be discussed later.