Early Times Report
Jammu, June 8: Former Chief Minister and president of Jammu and Kashmir National Conference Dr. Farooq Abdullah’s visit to Bengaluru, ahead of the opposition’s much-awaited meeting, raised many eyebrows.
Farooq Abdullah’s meeting with Janta Dal (Secular) leader former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda at his residence attached importance because Gowda’s party has been maintaining distance from opposition unity.
Instead of joining the opposition’s camp, Janta Dal (Secular) is exploring the possibility of entering into an alliance with the BJP in the coming Lok Sabha elections.
Former Chief Minister of Karnataka and son of H D Deve Gowda, H D Kumaraswamy has already announced not to join the opposition’s unity efforts.
It is widely believed that Dr. Farooq Abdullah visited Gowdas only to stop them from forming an alliance with the BJP in the next Lok Sabha elections.
Notably, the June 12 opposition meeting has been posted and now it is proposed to be held on June 23 at Patna. Galaxy of opposition leaders including Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge are invited for the meeting.
The opposition’s meeting aims to form a combined anti BJP front to take on BJP led NDA in 2024 parliament elections.
Top leaders includingWest Bengal CM and TMC chief Mamata Banerjee, Jharkhand CM Hemant Soren, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, Shiv Sena (UBT) chief and former CM Uddhav Thackeray, NCP patriarch Sharad Pawar, DMK chief and Tamil Nadu CM M K Stalin and top Left party leaders including Sitaram Yechury of CPM, D Raja of CPI, Dr. Farooq Abdullah, Mehbooba Mufti and Dipankar Bhattacharya of CPI-ML( liberation) are expected to attend the meeting.
When Farooq Abdullah was asked that the JD(S) is not an invitee in the June 23 meeting, Abdullah was optimistic that slowly everyone in the opposition will come together “irrespective of what they are”.
About his meeting with former PM and the JD(S) supremo H D Deve Gowda, he said it was a courtesy call. “My visit was also to thank him for what he did as Prime Minister of India, how he tried to unite India together and what he did for my State. We had a free election,” Abdullah said. |
