Opposition parties will shortly call for a joint meeting as the first step towards building an anti-BJP forum by the end of this month, Congress general secretary K.C. Venugopal and JD(U)‘s national president Rajiv Ranjan alias Lalan Singh told reporters after a meeting between Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge and senior party leader Rahul Gandhi. Though, the Centre’s ordinance overriding the Delhi government’s control over its bureaucracy has complicated the equation, with the Congress yet to take a call on supporting the Aam Aadmi Party’s bid to stall the Bill replacing the ordinance.
“We will decide the date and venue of the opposition meeting in a day or two,” Mr. Venugopal said, adding that he expects a “vast majority” of opposition parties to attend the meeting. Mr. Ranjan also echoed the same thing. “We had a detailed discussion on the emerging consensus among the opposition parties,” Mr. Ranjan said. RJD leader and Bihar’s Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav had taken ill and couldn’t attend the meeting.
This is Mr. Kumar’s second meeting with the Congress leadership in a month’s time. He had last met Mr. Kharge and Mr. Gandhi on April 12. In the meantime, Mr. Kumar met West Bengal Chief Minister and TMC supremo Mamata Banerjee, Odisha Chief Minister and BJD President Naveen Patnaik, Telangana Chief Minister and BRS leader K. Chandrashekhar Rao, Delhi Chief Minister and AAP convener Arvind Kejriwal and Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav. All five parties are non-Congress allies and Mr. Kumar reached out to them to understand their position ahead of the 2024 general elections.
