21 Opposition parties unite to fight BJP in 2019

New Delhi: Top leaders of 21 Opposition parties, barring the BSP and the SP, Monday met here and vowed to forge a united front to fight and defeat the BJP in the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, alleging “systematic denigration of democracy” and assault on the Constitution and institutions like the RBI under the BJP government.

The Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and the Samajwadi Party (SP), who are major players in politically crucial Uttar Pradesh, skipped the meeting held on the eve of the Winter Session of Parliament starting Tuesday but no reason was given.

It is for the first time that AAP leader and Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal and his Andhra Pradesh counterpart and TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu attended a joint Opposition meet.

The meeting held in Parliament House annexe also came a day ahead of the results of Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Telangana and Mizoram Assembly polls.

After the meeting, the Opposition leaders said their parties decided to get together irrespective of their political ideologies due to “democratic compulsions”, to help protect the country, the Constitution and its institutions which allegedly were under attack by the BJP and the RSS.

They said the Opposition leaders will meet again and chalk out a strategy to oust the BJP from power and will move jointly forward and prepare an action plan in the coming days.

A joint statement issued later said India needs a government, for which democracy is the “magna carta” beyond the victories and losses of electoral battles.

“Innumerable deficiencies, failures and plausible doubts on the neutral functionality of EVM’s per se have raised a question on the neutrality of poll process itself. It is our firm belief that this needs to be redressed without question and without delay,” it said.

“It is in the interests of safeguarding and strengthening our Constitutional Republic and People’s livelihood that this RSS/BJP government is ousted,” the statement said, calling upon all secular progressive parties to join hands.

Leaders of the Congress, Left parties and various regional parties like the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP), DMK, All-India Trinamool Congress (AITC), Telugu Desam Party (TDP), Janata Dal (Secular), Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) besides some small parties were present during the meeting. In all, 21 Opposition parties attended the meeting, according to a participant.

Among some of the prominent leaders who attended the meet were former Prime Ministers Manmohan Singh and H.D. Deve Gowda, UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi, Congress president Rahul Gandhi, NCP chief Sharad Pawar, TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, DMK’s M.K. Stalin and RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav.

Rahul Gandhi said the meeting was very productive and everyone decided to stop the BJP from further assault of institutions and the Constitution.