‘Can Nitish Kumar…?’: Sushil Modi quashes possibility of oppn unity
Bihar CM Nitish Kumar and RJD chief Lalu Prasad Yadav said on Sunday that Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi asked them to meet again after the grand old party gets a new president.
BJP leader and former Bihar deputy chief minister Sushil Modi on Sunday brushed aside the possibility of a united opposition ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabha election. His statement came minutes after Bihar chief minister and Janata Dal (United) leader Nitish Kumar and Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) chief Lalu Prasad Yadav met Congress interim president Sonia Gandhi at her 10 Janpath residence in Delhi. The duo's meeting with Gandhi focused on opposition unity to dethrone the BJP in the general election.
The BJP MP said all political parties have very different interests, and also that “political conditions of every state are different”.
The BJP leader further asked if Kumar could make the Congress leadership and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) boss Arvind Kejriwal “sit together”.
“Can Nitish Kumar put OP Chautala (Indian National Lok Dal chief) and Congress together?” Modi further said, adding if the CPM and the Congress can be made to “sit together inside Kerala”.
“The Congress in Kerala is saying the CPM is the BJP's ‘A team’… Even if they (Kumar and Yadav) want, they cannot unite all the parties,” Modi was quoted as saying by ANI.
Congress and the AAP often spar over various issues, with the Kejriwal-headed party toppling a government of the grand old party in Punjab earlier this year.
The grand old party being the primary opposition in Kerala remains at loggerheads with the ruling CPM over various issues in the southern state.
Kumar and Yadav met Gandhi to discuss the strategy ahead of the 2024 general elections. This was the first meeting among the trio in over five years, and also since Kumar exited the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) and rekindled ties with the RJD and Congress to form a new government in Bihar.
Following the meeting, the Bihar CM and the RJD chief were seen all smiles and even raised their hands together in a show of strength in front of media persons. The leaders said Gandhi asked them to meet again after the new president of Congress is elected.
Both Kumar and Yadav highlighted the need to unite opposition parties in order to defeat the saffron camp in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
Earlier in the day, at an INLD rally in Haryana's Fatehabad, several opposition leaders, including Kumar, NCP boss Sharad Pawar and RJD's Tejashwi Yadav, among others, came together in yet another show of strength.
During the rally, Kumar cleared the air around talks of him becoming the prime ministerial candidate in 2024. He said that he is not a candidate, and there is no third front. “There should be one front, including Congress, then we can defeat BJP in 2024,” the Bihar CM added.
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