Patna. Leaders of several major Opposition political parties will brainstorm here today (Friday) on a strategy to form a strong front to harshly challenge the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and Prime Minister Narendra Modi in the Lok Sabha elections of 2024. Before the meeting, Trinamool Congress chief Mamata Banerjee bluntly said that the opposition leaders will fight together as a family against the Bharatiya Janata Party and the National Democratic Alliance.

Opposition sources say that during the opposition leaders’ consultation, the focus will be on the strategy of fighting together, overlooking issues related to leadership. On the other hand, differences over the opposition’s exercise of unity were overshadowed by the Aam Aadmi Party’s stance that if Congress does not promise to support it against the central government ordinance on control of administrative services in Delhi, the AAP He will hold a rally in Patna on Friday. I will withdraw from the meeting.

Congress Chairman Mallikarjun Kharge and former President Rahul Gandhi, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, Delhi Chief Minister and Party Coordinator Aam Aadmi Arvind Kejriwal, Jharkhand Chief Minister Hemant Soren, Chief Samajwadi party Akhilesh Yadav, Nationalist Congress Shiv Sena (UBT) head Uddhav Thackeray Party (NCP) Chairman Sharad Pawar and several other opposition leaders are scheduled to attend the meeting.

The Samajwadi Party of the politically most important state of Uttar Pradesh attends the meeting. The Bahujan Samaj Party was not invited to this meeting. Rashtriya Lok Dal Chairman Jayant Chaudhary will not be able to attend the meeting due to some personal commitment.

Trinamool Congress Head Mamata Banerjee, Secretary General Abhishek Banerjee and People’s Democratic Party Leader Mehbooba Mufti, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann, Party MP Aam Aadmi, Sanjay Singh, reached Patna on Thursday. The meeting is being hosted by Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav. The meeting will take place at the residence of the Chief Minister ‘1 Anne Marg’.

A day before the opposition meeting, Mamata Banerjee said on Thursday that prominent opposition leaders are gathering here to fight together as a family against the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). After reaching Patna, Mamta Banerjee met with Rashtriya Janata Dal Chairman Lalu Prasad Yadav, former Bihar Chief Minister Rabri Devi and Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav. Later, Mamta also met with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar.

Sources associated with the opposition said that this meeting can be seen as the start of opposition unity to take on the government headed by Narendra Modi and a basic framework in this direction to move forward will be discussed. For now, however, questions related to leadership and shared seating will be ignored, he added. A senior opposition leader said on condition of anonymity: “This is just the beginning. It is important to have ideas. It is unlikely that electoral strategy, leadership issues and the distribution of seats will be discussed at this time.

He said that the issues raised by the opposition parties to corner the BJP would be the main agenda of the meeting and in this context the Manipur violence and the alleged failure of the Center are likely to be discussed. Kejriwal’s push for a discussion on the Center’s ordinance on deregulation of administrative services in the national capital will be closely watched. It will be interesting to see how Congress reacts to this. Congress has yet to open its letters as to whether or not it will support AAP if the central government introduces this ordinance in Parliament.

This meeting of opposition parties takes place at a time when the news of their mutual distancing has also come to the fore. Congress Lok Sabha leader Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury sits in a dharna outside the bloc’s office in Murshidabad district, demanding action against the ruling Trinamool Congress workers who allegedly attacked Congress workers in West Bengal.

The BJP is targeting opposition parties over differences and repeatedly raising the leadership question as to who will be the face of the opposition prime minister. Bihar Congress chief Akhilesh Prasad Singh responded to the BJP’s criticism, saying that the issue of the opposition alliance’s prime ministerial candidate is not important as the leadership issue can be resolved together after defeating the BJP in the general elections of 2024. It is.

Communist Party of India (CPI) leader D. Raja described the meeting of opposition leaders in Patna as a step in the “right direction”. He will also attend this meeting. Tamil Nadu Chief Minister MK Stalin, Communist Party of India Marxist General Secretary Sitaram Yechury and Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) General Secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya also agreed to attend the meeting.

Janata Dal (United) chief spokesman KC Tyagi said 15 opposition leaders are expected to attend the meeting. Tyagi said: “We have not invited Mayawati, Naveen Patnaik, K Chandrasekhar Rao and YS Jaganmohan Reddy. In such a situation, where does the question of these leaders staying away from the meeting arise? (agency)