Nitish said the search was not for a “third front” but a mutually beneficial alliance of all parties united against BJP. He invited Congress to join the proposed alliance. Former Punjab deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal attended the rally.
Ironically, INLD hadn’t invited Congress and AAP to the rally commemorating its founder and ex-deputy PM Devi Lal’s birth anniversary. Of the regional powerhouses that received invitations, the notable absentees were DMK, TRS and TMC. There was no clarity on whether Andhra CM YS Jagan Mohan Reddy had been invited. NC’s Farooq Abdullah, Meghalaya governor Sat Pal Malik and Odisha CM Naveen Patnaik sent messages expressing their inability to attend the rally, sources said.
Bihar CM Nitish told former Punjab deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal who was on the dais, “I have a close relationship with your father…I request you not to get distracted and join us to strengthen the group”. Sources said Nitish may have been alluding to speculation about Sukhbir meeting senior BJP functionaries recently.
Sukhbir said “the real NDA” was on the stage, claiming that when the saffron alliance was formed, BJP had only a few seats and it was because of the struggle and work done by its partners, including Shiv Sena, NDA, INLD and others, that NDA was able to form the government.
NCP chief Sharad Pawar and CPM’s Sitaram Yechury, among the few big names at the rally, repeated Nitish’s appeal to all opposition parties to join hands against the BJP-led government at the Centre and “support the farming and labour class”.
Pawar accused the Centre of forgetting the promises made when the three contentious farm laws were withdrawn, including the withdrawal of criminal cases against those booked during the farmers’ agitation and legal status to MSP. Yechury said the real owners of the country were the people and the government was “only a manager” who needed to be replaced in 2024. “Otherwise, these divisive forces will ruin the country’s social fabric”.
With his deputy Tejashwi Prasad Yadav looking on, Nitish said he was now “running a government in Bihar with the support of seven parties, and they are all left alone”. He claimed that when he was with BJP, former Haryana CM and INLD patriarch O P Chautala would advise him to leave the saffron fold.
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