The ripple effect of the efforts for a new ‘East India Company’, involving Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress, Nitish Kumar’s Janata Dal (U) and Naveen Patnaik’s BJD, on Friday saw the left parties as also the Samajwadi Party springing into action in view of the evolving political equations.
If senior CPI(M) leader Sitaram Yechury met JD(U) chief Sharad Yadav, whose party seems all set to break its 17-year ties with the BJP, SP supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav met CPI veteran AB Bardhan.
Yechury said left parties want unity of parties on the basis of alternative policies. “What we want is alternative policies. left parties have called a political convention on July one. It will discuss the alternative policy framework,” Yechury told reporters after the 30-minute meeting with the NDA convenor.
Asked whether the left would join a Third Front, he said it “depends upon the programme and policies” of such a platform. He, however, made it clear that there was “no such talk” (of third front) at the meeting.
Observing that nothing much should be made out of his meeting Yadav, Yechury said the JD(U) chief had invited him for dinner which he could not attend. “There is no politics ... We have been old friends.” Party general secretary Prakash Karat had on Thursday ruled out any effort by the left to forge a third front and said the electoral strategy would only be to have a temporary arrangement based on seat adjustments and tactics.
The emerging political situation came up for discussion at the Mulayam-Bardhan meeting. CPI sources said Bardhan was of the view that a non-Congress, non-BJP platform could be possible only after the elections.
However, the two leaders felt the need to step up campaign on crucial issues affecting the people, they said. Bardhan had opposed the idea of a Federal Front mooted by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, saying such a platform was neither feasible nor would it inspire people’s confidence.
Maintaining that people wanted a Government whose policies were opposed to the ‘anti-people policies’ being pursued by the UPA Government, he said, “These policies have also the support of Opposition BJP which is now set on a strident communal course with the elevation of Narendra Modi.”
The left parties had at times earlier sought to form a Third Front with the support of the likes of Mulayam and TDP chief Chandrababu Naidu among others.