Wednesday, 08 September 2021 | PNS | New Delhi
Chautala invites non-Cong Opp leaders to rally on Devi Lal’s birth anniversary to forge 3rd Front
Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar is likely to share the stage with a large number of Opposition parties, including TMC, Samajwadi Party, NCP, RLD, RJD, Shiromani Akali Dal, National Conference, at a rally at Jind in Haryana on September 25. Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (U) is the ruling NDA’s biggest partner after the BJP.
Pitching for a third front, INLD’s Om Prakash Chautala has tried to bring together Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav, Nitish, former Prime Minister HD Deve Gowda, and SAD supremo Parkash Singh Badal on one stage on the birth anniversary of former Deputy Prime Minister Devi Lal.
Sharing information about the rally and coming together of political stalwarts sans the Congress, INLD leader Abhay Chautala said Nitish, Mulayam, Deve Gowda and Badal have confirmed that they will attend the “Samman Samaroh” to mark the birth anniversary of Devi Lal. He further said NCP leader Sharad Pawar, TMC president and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, National Conference leader Farooq Abdullah and RLD leader Jayant Chowdhury have also been invited for this “huge” political rally on the occasion in Haryana’s Jind and their confirmation is awaited.
“Many like-minded leaders from non-BJP and non-Congress parties will come together on one stage and will raise issues that are close to the people, especially farmers’ issues,” Abhay said. The parties invited by INLD include those that are either in alliance with the Congress or the BJP.
INLD spokesperson Rakesh Sihag said party patriarch Om Prakash Chautala has “personally met” Deve Gowda and Mulayam and invited them for the rally. “It will be a huge rally and people from various States will attend it,” he said.
Nitish, who along with his party colleague KC Tyagi, had met Chautala at his residence in Gurugram last month and had termed it a courtesy call.
Abhay said that with huge political unrest in the country, citizens are now looking for an alternative to the BJP and the Congress. By bringing all these leaders “our aim is to form the third front for the overall welfare of the country and the people,” Chautala said.
Om Prakash Chautala, 86, after his release from Delhi’s Tihar Jail on July 2, had announced that he will contact Opposition leaders across the country to forge a “Third Front” at the national level. The former CM of Haryana had been serving a 10-year sentence in a recruitment scam.
He had said that before September 25, which is the birth anniversary of his father Chaudhary Devi Lal, he will try to meet Opposition leaders and urge them to come on one platform.
In recent months, Congress and other parties have been engaged in an effort to unifying the Opposition parties to take on the might of BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the next Lok Sabha elections. Congress had even hosted a breakfast meeting of the 17 Opposition leaders in the midst of the Monsoon Session that saw them coming under one umbrella to confront the Modi Government on a range of issues including the controversial farm bills and Pegasus snooping case.
During the same time, Sharad Pawar along with former Union Minister now with TMC, Yashwant Sinha had convened a meeting of Opposition leaders which saw participation of 12 members from Opposition camp but without Congress. During the fag end of the Parliament session in August, Mamata Banerjee too visited Delhi and called on Congress leaders Sonia Gandhi and Rahul Gandhi and stated that there is a need for a joint Opposition to take on the BJP. Last month, on three occasions the Opposition parties had met and passed resolutions against the Modi Government on a range of issues.
