No sign of let-up in INDIA turbulence as TMC skips Oppn floor leaders’ meet chaired by Kharge

The 14-member coordination committee, set up to work out the nuts and bolts of the alliance, also unlikely to meet anytime soon

Mamata Banerjee and Mallikarjun Kharge | ANI File Photos

New Delhi: The Trinamool Congress (TMC) Friday stayed away from a meeting of INDIA bloc leaders chaired by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge to coordinate during the ongoing budget session of Parliament, reaffirming its virtual exit from the grouping set up eight months ago.

Speaking to ThePrint, a senior TMC leader ruled out any possibility of the party joining the daily coordination meeting of INDIA bloc leaders during the remainder of the session, which is also the last sitting of the 17th Lok Sabha before the general elections due in April-May, signalling that the Congress’s attempts to mend fences with West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee have been unsuccessful so far.

With the coalition, which had its first formal meeting in Patna last June, stumbling from one crisis to another, the sub-groups, including a 14-member coordination committee, that were set up to work out the nuts and bolts of the alliance, are also unlikely to meet anytime soon. So far, the coordination committee met only once, at NCP leader Sharad Pawar’s residence on 13 September last year.

“There are no meetings scheduled for the coordination committee in the near future. Whatever talks are taking place are solely happening among top leaders of the parties. But the coordination committee, which was supposed to draw up joint electoral and campaign strategies, is not likely to meet in the coming days. There is no such plan,” a Rajya Sabha MP, who is a member of the coordination committee, told ThePrint.

While it was trouble foretold for the alliance, with internal contradictions holding up seat-sharing and joint mass contact programmes despite five meetings between June and December, it finds itself in complete disarray ever since Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar pulled the Janata Dal United out of INDIA, and joined hands with the BJP to form a new government.

Effectively, it is back to square one for the Opposition. In other words, the prevailing state of the INDIA bloc is reminiscent of the situation the Opposition found itself in when its leaders got into a huddle, ironically at the Patna residence of the Bihar CM, last summer to stitch together a coalition to effectively challenge the BJP in 2024.

Before INDIA came into existence, 16 parties were already in alliance in different states, including the JD(U) as part of the mahagathbandhan in Bihar. The national level umbrella alliance meant an addition of about a dozen parties, the important ones being the TMC, the Aam Aadmi Party, the Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Lok Dal, the National Conference, and the People’s Democratic Party.

Soon after Mamata announced the TMC’s plan to go solo in the Lok Sabha polls in Bengal, her Punjab counterpart Bhagwant Mann ruled out any AAP-Congress deal in the state. The SP and the RLD have already worked out their alliance, with the latter getting seven in Uttar Pradesh. Subsequently, the SP announced 16 candidates, offering just 11 seats to the Congress. Akhilesh Yadav has virtually given a take-it-or-leave it offer, it is learnt.

“The Congress has not yet accepted the proposal. But our leader is in talks with Ashok Gehlot to iron out the differences. And it is not just about numbers. It is also about the distribution of seats. For instance, the SP has requested the Congress to give up seats it has been losing by vast margins in election after election. A few such seats have been identified in the Bundelkhand region. My understanding is that a pact will be worked out. Both sides are mindful of its necessity,” an SP leader told ThePrint.

There are no talks between the Congress, the NC and the PDP. As it is, INDIA remains only on paper. In terms of alliance, the opposition parties have gone back to where they stood before the Patna meeting.

(Edited by Gitanjali Das)