PATNA/NEW DELHI: Bihar’s ruling grand alliance’s key component JD-U will not take part in Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Yatra in Srinagar on January 30, in emerging signs of disunity among opposition parties wanting to put up a joint fight against the BJP in 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The main allies in the ‘mahagathbandhan’ in Bihar include Congress, RJD and the JD-U. Rajiv Ranjan Singh alias Lalan Singh, national president of the JD-U, said he has written to Congress chief Mallikarjun Kharge explaining his busy election campaign in Nagaland on the day the Congress leader leads the yatra in Srinagar.
The JD-U chief excused himself by saying that he had to kickstart the poll campaign for the northeastern state on the same date (January 30). However, he said the Srinagar event would be “historic.”
Singh’s letter said: “It would have been a great moment to be present at the event. But I express my regret for not being able to attend the programme,” said the letter addressed to Kharge. No other senior leader of JD (U) has been asked to attend the programme. The JD-U’s distancing from the yatra is being seen as a jolt to Opposition unity for Lok Sabha polls.
“If Lalan Singh was not free, he would have assigned another leader to attend the event,” said a JD-U leader. On the other hand, the stance of other constituent of the grand alliance, the RJD, is not clear. “Top leaders of the party will take a final call,” said RJD spokesperson Mritunjay Tiwari.
BJP took a dig at the JD-U chief’s letter saying the all talks on Opposition unity at the Centre were nothing but eyewash. “No alliance will stand against Prime Minister Narendra Modi in 2024 Lok Sabha election,” said BJP Rajya Sabha MP Sushil Kumar Modi.
“There are no two opinions about the decline in democratic values of the country. Various government institutions that are supposed to ensure checks and balances on unrestrained executive powers are being systematically destroyed”, Singh stated in his letter to the Congress chief.
“My party sincerely feels that the need of the hour is a unified opposition and expects that the Indian National Congress takes appropriate steps in this direction,” said the letter. Political analysts pointed out that the JD-U nurtures the ambition to project Nitish Kumar as the PM candidate.