The two major Opposition parties — Congress and the Trinamool Congress — are likely to take a final call this week to finalise the candidate for the Presidential elections.
In the scheduled meeting of Congress president Sonia Gandhi and West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Tuesday, the focus will also be on chalking out the contours of an anti-BJP front on the national level.
Mamata, who is also the chief of the TMC, would also meet Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal even though the latter is mired in deep controversy over the alleged allegations of graft by his own partymen.
Congress sources said that Sonia is going to be proactively engaged in uniting the Opposition and impress upon them to sink their differences and collectively take on the BJP. The State unit of the Congress has its own differences with the TMC, but Sonia is ready to overlook these.
West Bengal Congress president Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury has expressed his discontent over Sonia’s proposed meeting with Mamata Banerjee. In his letter, Chowdhury stressed that the Congress central leadership should be careful while dealing with the West Bengal CM because most of the Trinamool leaders are under scanner in Narada and Saradha case.
Sonia has already has met leaders of several parties including Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar and CPI(M) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury in the last few weeks to discuss the possibility of putting up a joint candidate for the Presidential elections and propping up a anti-BJP front to take on the Modi Government in 2019 general elections. .
After holding talks with Mamata, Sonia would meet other key Opposition leaders such as BSP chief Mayawati and DMK leader MK Stalin. She has already met National Conference leader Omar Abdullah and spoken on phone with Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav and RJD chief lalu Prasad, NCP’s Sharad Pawar and Indian Union Muslim league leader PK Kunhalikutty. Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi too has spoken over phone with former Uttar Pradesh CM Akhilesh Yadav with whom the party stitched an alliance in the just concluded UP Assembly polls.