Amidst moves by Trinamool Congress supremo Mamata Banerjee for a federal front, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik seemed to be positively inclined towards such an option.
Talking to mediapersons after his return from New Delhi on Thursday, Naveen said that such a front is good for the country. Asked whether he will take initiative, Naveen said he will certainly look into the matter.
Naveen, however, kept his cards close to his chest on his future course of action and said it is still early days. “Let’s see how things will proceed,” he said. The Chief Minister also said that nothing has been decided on the federal front as yet. “Let’s see how it works out,” he said.
Ruling out any truck with either Congress or BJP, Naveen on Tuesday had indicated that he was open to joining a Third Front or a Federal Front before the Lok Sabha elections.
He was non-committal on whether Left parties could be part of such a grouping. Naveen led a delegation of BJD MPs and MLAs to the Rashtrapati Bhavan to submit a memorandum to President Pranab Mukherjee with one crore signatures demanding special category status to Odisha. “The President said that he will go through the memorandum and submit it to the Government,” he said.
He said that the June 12 rally was held by the BJD at New Delhi to press the state’s demand for special category status.
Condemning naxalite violence strongly, Naveen said that a resolution was passed at the meeting convened by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at New Delhi on June 10 to combat naxalite violence.