Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar cancelled his visit to Tamil Nadu on Tuesday at the last minute even as his deputy, Tejashwi Yadav, and party colleague and minister Sanjay Jha left for Chennai to attend a function to mark the birth centenary celebrations of late Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) leader M Karunanidhi.
Kumar was scheduled to inaugurate a memorial to Karunanidhi in Tiruvarur and return to Patna on Wednesday two days before the meeting of non-Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) parties he has convened on Friday to prepare a common ground ahead of the 2024 national polls. The meeting is likely to be held at Kumar’s residence to ensure confidentiality.
No official reason was given for the cancellation. The visit was given much importance against the backdrop of efforts to forge unity among non-BJP parties. DMK, the ruling party of Tamil Nadu that sends the fifth-highest (39) lawmakers to parliament, is among the key parties involved in the unity efforts.
HT on Monday reported that no breakthrough was expected at the Patna meeting and that it will be more of a warm-up for subsequent rounds of engagement. Efforts were on to make a declaration of intent at the meeting to address why the non-BJP parties are keen to join hands and why the meeting in Patna is important.
The participants at the meeting were expected to speak of securing the character of a secular and democratic India and to highlight how the supremacy of the Constitution has been assaulted.
A proposal to put up common candidates for at least 400-450 seats against the BJP will also be discussed at another meeting. Many of the non-BJP parties have been fighting the Congress in some states.
Kumar has been reaching out to non-BJP parties even as Jitan Ram Manjhi’s Hindustani Awam Morcha was on the verge of leaving his ruling alliance in Bihar. Bharat Rashtra Samithi has also decided against attending the Patna meeting even as its leader and Telangana chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao has been one of the key interlocutors for the unity.
The meeting was earlier scheduled for June 12 but it was cancelled to ensure that the parties involved sorted out their differences and were willing to make sacrifices and adjustments.
