The Janata Party could be back in a new avatar more than two decades after its disintegration into a plethora of regional parties. The constituents of the erstwhile formation met here on Thursday and authorised Samajwadi Party chief Mulayam Singh Yadav to decide on the modalities of the merger. The attempt to reunite the Janata Parivar is seen as a desperate attempt to take on the BJP, which dealt a major blow to several of these outfits in the last lok Sabha polls.
The new party, comprising SP, JD(U), JD(S), RJD, INlD and Samajwadi Janata Party, is likely to be named Samajwadi Janata Dal. Mulayam Singh Yadav could be the president of the new outfit.leader of these six parties met at the residence of Mulayam Singh Yadav in Delhi on Thursday where the agenda and structure of the proposed new outfit came up for discussion.
Divulging the details, senior JD(U) leader and former Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said that the leaders met to “work out modalities” for the merger. “All leaders felt there should be “one party” as they have the same philosophy and principle,” Nitish said.
This was the second such meeting for the new outfit. Besides Nitish and Mulayam, RJD chief lalu Prasad, JD(U) president Sharad Yadav, SP leader Ram Gopal Yadav, JD(S)’s HD Deve Gowda, INlD’s Dushyant Chautala and SJP’s Kamal Morarka were also present.In an attempt to bring more members of the fragmented Janata Parivar, efforts will also be made to bring in MP Virendra Kumar, a former leader of the Janata Party, and now chief of Socialist Janata Party.
In their first joint action, the new “Janata” group would hold a ‘dharna’ on December 22 in Parliament against Government’s “failure” to bring back black money stashed abroad, and its alleged U-turn on farmers’ issue and rising unemployment, Nitish said..
Asked whether the move to join forces was borne of a “fear of Narendra Modi”, Kumar said it is not the case but the aim was to form a platform in the current political atmosphere.He said that the six parties would like to work in tandem with entities like the left Front, which would be approached. Kumar did not, however, elaborate further on the discussions.
On a query whether the proposed party would contest the upcoming Delhi Assembly polls, Kumar said the leaders concentrated on the “national scene” and the talks were not restricted to any particular state.Nitish said while these parties have been speaking in the same voice on issues of public interest in Parliament, they have decided to hold their first joint action by organising a ‘dharna’ outside its premises on December 22.
In an indication that the issue of black money would be on top their agenda, the December 22 dharna will question the NDA Government’s flip flop on the issue.Nitish said that its pre-poll promise about bringing back black money to the country and using it to give Rs 15 lakh to every citizen has not been fulfilled.
He said that issue related to farmers will also be raised in the dharna. Kumar said that while farmers were promised an MSP which was 1.5 times more than their input cost, the Government is now discouraging States from giving a bonus to farmers as it is pushing out private players.
“It is a U-turn,” he said, adding that the six parties will also highlight the issue of unemployment as the NDA dispensation has allegedly put a ban on new openings in Government jobs.